Weights

June 13, 2013
Penny weighs more than 2 pounds while Buffy is about 1 1/2 pounds and Betty is an ounce or two under her. Penny is not as big as she looks though. As soon as she sits down she grows 3x her size, the others expand too but not as much as her. They are all sweet but don't like to be handled during their free-time outside. Unless they come to you, they don't usually like being petted. When you pet Betty, she goes *peep peep peep peeeeeeeep* like you are squeezing the squeaks out of her. This could mean 'stop' 'it feels good' 'keep doing that', and a number of other things. I am not sure if she'll have that voice the rest of her life. Penny makes the cutest sounds. When she sees you for the first time in awhile, she makes a who-who. We think it's her 'hello' call. Buffy makes a constant noise even while she is sleeping. Once in a while she stops but rarely.

Finished Coop

June 8, 2013
Here is the finished coop. We hang a large water feeder under the coop and a plastic dish of fermented dry food "wet food" on a piece of flat stone. At night we put the wet food up in the coop so in the morning they can eat a little breakfast. They have a small water in the coop and a dry food feeder. They have three nesting boxes, we got rid of the fourth one. There is a perch inside the coop and a ladder to the nesting boxes. They could sleep on either one. Something you don't see here is a perch we added in the run. Since they are still small they slide in between the bumps on the ramp, but it seems to be fun to them. Because of this they don't go up the ramp, but when they are bigger they probably will. During the hot summer days we open the window for extra ventilation. The nesting boxes have been blocked for now with cardboard so the chicks get used to sleeping on a roost. We have 5 locks. One on the nest boxes's door, the run door, the ramp door, the bottom of the coop door and the coop door.

Welcome to the Coop

June 12, 2013
Welcome to our finished coop! The girls love the run, they enjoy pecking at the scratch we give them and like looking for bugs. We used to keep our com-posters back there so a lot of bugs live in the dirt. Before the coop was done, they used to peck at the scratch which would be on the cement, and we weren't sure if that was good for their beaks. The coop is doing the vegetable garden some good. When we let them out they usually hang out over by the fence and the run for awhile. We are going to put a net over the vegetable garden soon. It will take awhile for the garden to recuperate though. They aren't going to like being kept out of there. We have a kitty litter box in the run that we will put wood ash in so they can dust bathe. Wood ash smothers the fleas, ticks etc. better than dirt.

Brooder Box

2nd week-June 5, 2013
This is where they used to live. We got them being about two weeks old and they lived in a much smaller box, but after two days we realized they were crowded. So we moved them here. But we soon noticed this too was too small for them. When we took off the wire top, they'd poke their heads an inch or two above the edge of the box. We had already bought the coop pre-built, but we had to modify a few things. The guy used the wrong wire, and he built four nesting boxes. So we tore out the whole inside, and instead of three floors, we made it two so during hot days the chicks could go under the coop in the shade. We would put their wet food and a big water there. Their dry food and another water were up in the coop. We made our own ramp, although since they are still small, they slide in between bumps in the ramp. Their first day in the coop was supposed to be June 5, but we put it off one day, and the next night, their first night in the coop, there was an absolutely huge thunderstorm. We were hoping they'd have good memories of the coop. They didn't. Buffy acted all mopey and sad and the other two ignored us. They blamed us for that incident.

Flight Feathers

June 12, 2013
These are our mature girls. They are 8-9 weeks old. They have no more baby fluff, and they all have their adult voices, except for Betty who still peeps like a chick. When they were smaller, 3-4 weeks old, we only let them run around in the pond area. But they began venturing out into the pond area so we let them run around there. They tore up the raised beds we have. At first they only hung out in the first bed, tearing up the chard. They made a huge indent where they dust bathed and occasionally sun bathed. Then they began venturing out into the 2nd and 3rd beds. They had already trampled what they didn't eat and tore all the lower leaves off the lettuce plants. We had to build a small fence of sticks around our green beans because they took a liking to those. They love the chives, they trample and devour them. Every time I pick them up after they go through the chives, they smell like onions. They like to rest in the shade of the kale and when it is time for bed and I have to round them up and bring them inside, they like to stay in the first bed, which is close to the couch so it takes 10 minutes to catch them.

Peepers

June 12, 2013
We got chickens about 6 weeks ago. They used to be cute little fuzz balls.

We named them Copper Penny, Black Betty, and Big Buffy. Back then you couldn't even tell Penny and Buffy apart! We constantly had to cover the couch in towels and let them run around it. We fed them Organic Chick Starter. We had to give them grit since they didn't go outside. We kept them in a big plastic bin filled with wood shavings. They were constantly tipping their water over and creating big messes. So we put a large piece of slate and the bottom of a pot under it to raise it up higher.