Animal Lovers Web Blog

Well, it was only a matter of time before our two cockerels decided that life together, sharing our lovely hens, was just a little too close for comfort. Primrose, our baby cockerel (how he got his name is answered elsewhere), is around five months old now and definitely in the throws of sexual maturity.  His not-so-manly crowing still needs some serious working on! Unfortunately, Tiger, our older cockerel is having none of it and is making his feelings very clear.  We have had to intervene to stop any serious fighting and poor Primrose has taken to flying out of the chicken run to escape from harms way.

We had been hopeful that both boys would see sense - they have a huge free-ranging area to live in together with seven hens to share.  In fact, Primrose didn’t seem to take any interest in Tiger’s harem at all and stuck to entertaining our other two hens, Amber and Velvet, that were hatched out at the same time as Primrose.

As an interim measure, our old dog run has been transformed into a chicken house and Primrose the cockerel, Velvet and Amber our hens are now settling into their new accommodation.  Unfortunately, the fencing around the run isn’t as high a challenge as we hoped and I seem to have spent most of the day rounding up chickens who really don’t seem to appreciate that we are trying to do our best for them!

In the end, the scissors had to be sharpened and Primrose, Tiger, Amber and Velvet have all had a lop-sided haircut and said goodbye to their flight feathers.  Problem solved…

…I wish!  Went to lock up the hen “houses” this evening and couldn’t locate Primrose in the dog run.  My worse fear was that he had run away for good and so it was with slightly less anxiety that I was to find him perched back in the old hen house with the other chickens.  Tiger, thankfully, was giving him a wide berth.  Fortunately it was dusk, otherwise I think that he would have had Primrose for supper!!

Poor Primrose doesn’t know if he is coming or going (it’s not surprising with a name like that, I suppose!).  I think that I might have to try trimming his other wing tomorrow and, ultimately, a new home may be the best option for our darling young cockerel in the long run. It really does appear that keeping two cockerels is indeed one too many!

Diane
Animal Lovers Web.com

Our baby chicks are almost eighteen weeks old now and not really babies at all anymore!  The two hens, Amber and Velvet are now officially “Point of Lay Pullets”, which means that they will be laying their very first eggs anytime soon.  Ordinarily, we’d be more than happy to have the extra eggs as, usually in the winter, egg production is markedly reduced. Unfortunately someone forgot to tell our other hens this fact!  It has been a pleasent surprise to still be enjoying almost full capacity egg production (i.e. 3 or 4 per day!) from our gorgeous birds, despite the freezing temperatures and what seems to be constant icy rain. 

It’s going to be tricky spotting exactly when Amber and Velvet do start to lay, as all the hens seem to have adopted a special area of their own in one of our barns as their new nesting area.  Usually, each morning, they will all take turns to sit on any laid eggs and plop one out themselves.  We could do with a webcam being honed in to see if either of the new chicks join in the morning ritual! 

Our laying hens all produce very similar sized brown-coloured eggs.  Maybe if we’re really optomistic, Amber and Velvet might surprise is with something a bit different, just to show us how unique they are!

Both of our young hens are still a little smaller than their older hen-house mates and have some growing yet to do.  Primrose, our third baby chick, is gradually changing into a magnificent mini-me cockeral version of his dad, Tiger. Our concerns about infighting between the two cockerels are yet to be realised. Primrose seems to be happy having Amber and Velvet to himself and Tiger tends to leave them alone - he has five other girls to keep him occupied! We suspect feathers may fly soon if Primrose’s pending sexual maturity causes him to encroach on Tiger’s territory - we’re going to have to keep a close eye.

Despite Primrose’s less than masculine name, he is starting to try and “cock-a-doodle-do” to emulate his dad’s decibel-crunching cries every morning..afternoon..evening…!  It is rather a pathetic effort at the moment and he does have some serious competition, poor soul.  His attempts rather remind us of a pubescent boy’s struggle to control a breaking voice, all to no avail!

All our chickens are looking a bit bedraggled, windswept and weatherbeaten at the moment.  They can’t resist trying to dig up juicy worms and bugs in their waterlogged grassy run even when there’s a force 10 gale blowing outside.  We’re sure they probably have the same opinion of our appearance really.  Farm life goes on, whatever the weather and chickens poop won’t clean up itself.  However, the reward of a delicious runny egg curtesy of our beautiful, friendly feathered friends makes it all worth while!

Diane

AnimalLoversWeb.com

Well, we finally bit the bullet and decided that we had to try to integrate our new chicks into the main hen house with the older birds. They’re about 10 weeks old now and getting really quite big.  In an attempt to make the transition as smooth as possible, all of our chickens have been mingling together in the run for a couple of weeks now and seem to have to been getting on together pretty well.  The chicks have also been exploring the hen house and helping themselves to food and water.

We decided that the best thing to do would be to close the door to the barn where the chicks normally sleep at night and see if they voluntarily made their way into the hen house.  Unfortunately, we think they may have been at the end of the queue when brains were given out and they just stood around helplessly at the hen house door, looking at the other chickens who had already tucked themselves up for the night!

Once it got really dark, we decided that a helping hand was necessary before they all became supper for any lucky fox that may be around.  After lifting them onto the perch, they seemed to settle down for the night, which was a real relief.   A few timely checks into the evening suggested all was well and we set our alarm clocks early to open the hen house door this morning.

It was with trepidation that we greeted the chicks this morning, but are delighted to say that all three chicks were still happily perching and we were really pleased.  

After a couple of nights assisting the chicks to bed, we hope that we can leave them to their own devices and that they will make their own way into the hen house at night, even if their old barn door is still open.  It seems to be working out ok so far and we are very pleasantly surprised.  Obviously, as Primrose , our cockerel chick gets older, harmony in the hen house may not last forever.  We’ll savour the moments whilst they last!

Diane

www.AnimalLoversWeb.com

Our baby chicks are now 7 weeks old and it is now time to start integrating them with the adult chickens. Since they left the brooder at about 5 weeks old they have spent their time in a cozy little building we call the green barn. We did build a little “patio” area for them out of wooden pallets and chicken wire, to allow the adult chickens to see them from a safe distance while they were housed in the barn. As the establishment of the new pecking order amongst chickens can be quite a cruel and even dangerous process.
Luckily, we have found that our own bred chicks have always been accepted very well into the group. Although, who knows what goes on in the henhouse overnight, other than when we have had too many cockerels, there has never been any signs of significant injuries occuring overnight.
We let the chicks into the main chicken run area over the weekend, and distracted them all for a few minutes with their favourite treat which is bread. The chicks were right in there with the others for the bread and apart from the odd little peck now and again from the hens, they held their own. Tiger the cockerel is above all that anyway, he just stoops now and again to get the pieces that happen to land near him. Most of the time a cheeky hen scampers in and steals it, just before he gets it, and he seems to maintain a philosophical approach about it and accepts this.
The young chicks managed to get their fair share of the bread. They also pecked frantically at the fresh grass and then had a general wander around the run, staying mainly together most of the time. They didn’t wander anywhere that they shouldn’t over a period of about 2 hours which was very encouraging.
All went well then on the first day and they went back into their own barn to roost at the first sign of darkness, which is about 5 pm at the moment. We plan to repeat this daily over the next couple of weeks and then extend the time they are mingling with the adults, before housing them all together overnight in the next month or so.

John
www.AnimalLoversWeb.com