Chick News

We just got the last four of the little Peeps last week of the breed 'Australorp'. They were bred in Australia out of black Orpingtons and the name reflects this fact.
They supposedly are an improved version of the black Orpingtons, the idea was to make it an better utility bird and they are known to lay more then 250 eggs a year, the record was 346 eggs a year.
They seemed to be a bit smaller as the other chickens, when we got them even tough they still will be over 8 lbs compared to the 10 lbs of the Orpingtons, approximately the same size as the Welsummer chickens. The little Australorps remind me a little bit of fluffy Penguins, they are black with a white/greyish front rump and some have white markings in the face. Their feet are dark skinned, not yellow like the others.

Australorps

The other chickens are now a week older then the Australorps. It is amazing the growth they can make in one week. The first few days, every morning it seemed like they doubled in size and they had another row of new feathers. The are fully winged now, have some tail feathers and just are getting shoulder feathers. They start looking real funny being between the fluffy, little peep look and a real feathered look.

The Welsummer which are going to be a reddish brown are starting to show some of the Partridge pattern they will have

Look at the shoulder and wing feathers of the Welsummer chicks

The Orpingtons are growing really fast, when you hold them they feel like a hand full. Before, you hardly noticed you had any weight in your hand, but now you do notice they are getting heavier.

look the tiny tail, aren't they funny looking?

The chickens got big so fast and started to be more active, flapping their new wings, running around with no directions, just to be running, we felt they needed more room. So we made them a cardboard box brooder and moved them to the sun room. So far we had them in the aquarium right next to the dinner table. This was really nice to get them used to us, it also was amusing to watch them, it is almost like watching chicken TV. But now they are getting bigger, they are also starting to become more messy, smelly. So it was good that the outdoor temperature is picking up somewhat, because that let us move them into the unheated sun room. With the brooder lamp box inside the card board box run, they should stay warm. They look like they enjoying the space and seem fine with the cooler temperature in that room.


This is the new chicken set up

Our Boxer is fascinated by the chickens and likes to watch them. I am not so sure he thinks of them as play buddies, I think he is thinking "I know chicken? I like chicken!" So I don't trust him with them. His instinctual reflexes are quite strong, so he gets supervised visits with them. The top of the box is covered with bird netting, clipped to the sides, so the dog can not stick his head in there. Hopefully we will get him to the point that he just ignores them as they get bigger.

Chicks are here!

Finally, the little Peeps are here! Today we got our first baby chickens.
When I originally selected the chicken breeds to get I looked for some chickens which are all around good chickens for people like us, who keep chickens inside the city.
My criterias were:
1. good layers, because we are only allowed a limited number of chickens,
2. non flighty-so they don't jump the fence to the neighbors,
3. quiet and more docile-not to bother neighbors with noise,
4. easy going, friendly-to make it easier on us,
5. happy with confinement-because we are supposed to keep them confined in a chicken yard
6. Dual Purpose-which means also good for eating, because the ones who don't lay well, will be Dinner

The Breeds I selected are:
1. Australorp - it is like a Orpington chicken, large, black with bluish iridescent shimmer
2. Buff Orpington- large chicken, yellow buff color
3. Originally I wanted to get some Barnevelder chickens, a real pretty brown with black lace coloring, Dutch Breed, who lays large, dark brown eggs, but unfortunately they are all sold out until 2010.
So instead the Barnevelders we got the Welsummers, also a Dutch breed who also lays large, dark brown eggs and has a brown, light yellow partridge pattern.

Unfortunately we can't get all the chickens at once, some of them won't be hatched until next week, but today we got 4 Orpingtons and 4 Welsummers. We put up a brooder, right next to our dining table. The brooder is an converted aquarium, so we can see the chickens doing their thing while eating Breakfast and Dinner and the chickens get used to us more because they see us, they also get less spooked




Aren't those cute?

Eventually the Aquarium will get too small for the Brood and we will move them to a larger Box.
Little Chicks will grow fast, around six to seven week old they should be feathered out and we can move them to the chicken coop, with a heat lamp.

My Husband Greg has been building the coop for the last few weeks, it is almost done. It will have a double run. So I can let them use one run, let chicken weeds grow in the other side and once they used one run up, move them over to the other side and let the first side recover.
I wanted the Coop look nice, not be a eye sore and so I selected a real bright color for it, which also will look nice with the plantings around it.


The chicken area is located right next to my vegetable garden, so I can easily move the chicken manure to my compost bins and let them forage inside the vegetable garden to get all the bugs and weeds before I plant. I will built a forage hoop house with PVC pipes for them, which easily can be moved over the raised garden beds or in the lawn. That will contain them, so they don't scratch out all my good vegetables. Because they will try to eat anything if you let them.

So this is really exciting, it has been a long time since we had chickens. I am looking forward to eating Salmonella free eggs, Tiramisu made with raw egg instead cooked and free range eggs taste so much better and actually have more nutrients then commercially raised eggs.
According to two independent laboratory tests of free range eggs, which were instigated by Mother Earth Magazine, the eggs contained twice the amount of Vitamin E, up to six times a much beta carotene and four times as much Omega 3 fatty acids then commercially raised eggs. They also had half the cholesterol.
So just as Grandma said, eggs are good for you! What is not good for you is the way they are raised nowadays. It is not the fault of the Egg, it is the fault of greedy, commercial mass farming.
Which actually is the problem of a lot of the foods we consume.
But that will be for another post.