Our Chickens - Dust Baths and Sleepovers

The chickens are doing well. We've been getting between 4 and 7 eggs a day. Two went broody but I don't have a sufficient cage to "debroodify" them so I let them be. One has snapped out of it and one is still insisting. She likes to nest on a box on the floor. We will be letting her have a couple of eggs to hatch since she won't be knocking them to the ground like the other one did to the eggs we gave her.

Cluck Norris is proving to be a kind and gentle leader. He's never pushy. He never attempts to go after any of us. There is a fair amount of chicken-love going on, but he isn't overzealous with it. When he finds a tasty treat he is quick to alert the ladies of its location. It's fun to watch them communicate and interact with their environment. When we had Cluck's brothers there was a whole lot of rapin' goin' on and it wasn't acceptable. We ate those roosters.

The chickens like to take dust baths during the heat of the afternoon after we let them free. They especially like this spot next to my clothes line. It was where we used to keep our fire wood. It has a lot of sawdust in it.

Here is a video of some of our bathing beauties:

"Get out! I'm bathing!" says Pigeon.

We finally got all the debris out of the pool. It was loaded with tadpoles. That meant some of them got tossed out when the pine needles and twigs got scooped. The chickens went crazy over them! I knew that would eat frogs but never thought about the tadpoles. At least they didn't die in vain. Don't worry, my daughters scooped out a whole kiddie pool's worth and are raising them.

Somebody laid this oopsie egg with no shell in the yard. It's one of the 1-year-olds. We never had a shell-less egg until they started laying.

The Bear's bantam chickens are doing great! They're so small! One of the Ginger Old English is her best friend. Her name is Sky. That little chicken runs right up to her and jumps her hand. I wish I had photos of it! We got some tiny leg bands and put one on that chicken so we know which one she is for sure. Jojo also banded one, named Black Widow. She is a Silver Sebright.

The Bear and friend with two Ginger Old English bantam hens. They had a sleepover. They took them into the playhouse and let them go and just laughed and laughed!

We ended up with only four out of 15 chickens being roosters! They are three Golden Sebrights and one Silver Sebright. We didn't end up with any Ginger Old English roos. We were hoping for one rooster of each type, but honestly I'm just glad to not be overrun by boys!

The Bear and one of the Silver Sebrights

Loudmouth, one of our original chickens, is having some trouble getting around. When she was about a year old something happened to one of her legs. She convalesced in the coop for a couple of weeks. She gets around fine now. She has a limp but she's okay. It does make her easier to catch though, as you can see here.

I figured out what to do with some of the bantam's pretty tail feathers we find!

They're going to be the ends of my windchimes I've been making!

Maybe. The first feather I wrapped was easy. The second, not so much. It may be harder than I thought and the idea may get scrapped.

Anyway, I just thought I'd give you all an update on our chickens since it's been a while! Hope yours are doing great and providing delicious butt nuggets for your breakfasts. Thanks for stopping by!