Chickens in winter

The dogs, Cherisse and I reveled in the big snowstorm on December 29 which dumped about a foot of snow. The dogs raced through the drifts, and Cherisse and I made looping paths with our snowshoes so we could cross-country ski around the yard and through the woods. Not all of us were thrilled. Rebecca...

Nature’s miracles

My birthday nearly took a grim turn when a puppy guest suddenly chased after our chickens. The dog managed to grab a mouthful of Featherfoot’s feathers before the rooster—through sheer survival instinct—summoned a burst of speed that was remarkable, given his bad leg. When Cherisse went to investigate, she saw only one of the pullets,...

Goodbye Mr. Rooster

Mr. Rooster’s right leg has been deformed, as far as we can tell, from the beginning. We never saw any sign injury, but at about five months, when he was close to full grown, he had developed a thickened and slightly twisted right leg. This kept him from walking too far from the coop, but...

Chicken bunny

For the past three or so weeks, a baby bunny has been hanging out with the chickens. When we first noticed, it was a really tiny thing, going in and out from under a forsythia bush, where the chickens often take a siesta. At first I was worried that the chickens might try to kill...

Return of the prodigal daughter

Last night we planned to attend a friend's gallery opening in Providence, so Cherisse rounded up the chickens a bit early. When she made a final count, a Dominique was missing. We searched everywhere with the dogs, getting scratched in brambles, looking under every bush and up at every tree. There was no sign of...

More eggs!

This is not going to be the Egg Chronicles (I swear), but we are just too thrilled at the moment (I didn't imagine it would be quite this exciting). This morning we collected three eggs (one from a Dominique and two from RI Reds). One of the RI Reds is laying really long skinny eggs...

Eggs!

I have been without computer access for the last couple of days, and had planned on writing about the Common Ground Fair, which we went to on Saturday (it was fabulous). But there is much more exciting news. Some of the hens have started to lay eggs! We had two different house/chicken sitters; the first,...

Herding chickens

When we planned our garden gate, we wanted the rods to be spaced far enough apart for Rebecca to get through, but not wide enough for a dog’s head to get stuck. What we didn’t account for was chickens. The new iron gate is attached to a wooden fence, encircling the garden. We have a...

Free range chickens

Cherisse's mother and her husband are visiting from Colorado. They have taken on the project of electrifying the chicken house; providing more light in the winter will hopefully increase egg yield during the shorter, colder days. While they work, the chickens race about, pecking and scratching. The chickens seem to have good preservation instincts: they...

Featherfoot

McMurray Hatchery added a free “exotic” chick to our order. We believe we got a Cochin, although I haven’t been able to match it more specifically. She has grown quite large (she looks about twice the size of the others), and has the most resplendent feathers, almost peacock-like in coloring, all the way down to...