#poultry2023

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New rooster, free from a stranger who was moving & couldn't take him. He was delivered by his former owner and even came with a red hen who laid an egg on her very first day here (and most days since) so A+ deal really.

I haven't been able to get a pic that really shows his size, but him BIG, dwarfing all the hens and even our other rooster. Also he is beautiful; I hope he works out with the flock long term. We don't know what he is really, beyond that he hatched from a green egg, so there is Ameraucana/Easter Egger in him.

So far he's no trouble to us or the dogs, but upon release from introductory chicken jail he immediately set about stealing all the bitches from poor Maurice. There's been a bit of fighting between them, which I assume will settle down once they work out the new social order, but I've been sending Omie to break them up whenever I see it.

J named him Big Rico, so naturally his wife is now called Lola, even though she'll be indistinguishable from our other reds once her back feathers grow back in.

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New method discovered to break a broody hen: Chased around by the dog for a while

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The young hens are starting to lay - first olive eggs!

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I went to count chickens & do final egg check around dusk, and it's been rainy all day so it was especially dim. So I'm putting my hands in nest boxes, and I feel. Not. Eggshell. Where it sure looked like Egg should be.

It turned out to be one of those shell-less eggs, just a hiccup in a hen's egg-construction system, something that happens sometimes. But that was unsettling to put my hand on, when I expected a very different feeling.

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Got me some of these

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Sound on 🔊 for peeping