CHICKENS

What can I say about our chickens..........I love them. They entertain me......all 50 or so of them.

They free range and are supplemented with grain. We are rewarded with the best eggs........gathering from the nesting boxes, or going on a never ending Easter Egg hunt!

Some hens lay eggs and don't care about sitting on them. Other hens will sit on a nest no matter whose eggs are there, pecking at whatever tries to bother her! We usually have a variety of chicken age groups year around.
I am as protective of the new chicks as the mother hens are. Rowdy, Flop, Jack and Shadow have learned to keep their distance when encountering a hen with chicks..........either by my reminder, or by the hen puffing up and doing her little "get away from my babies or I will peck out your eyes" dance!

I have lost some and saved some from the various dangers on the farm.

Even though there is constant water available in the chicken yard area, they like to drink from the goat and horse water tubs as well. If the tubs aren't completely full, the chicks sometimes fall in and drown. Responding to their loud peeps of distress I've scooped up more that one little wet fluff ball.....shivering, holding it in the sun to warm it up, then returning it to it's mom. I devised a couple of "rescue ladders" made from chicken wire that I've hung on the inside of the goat water tubs. That way the animals can still drink and hopefully if a chick falls in, it will have a better chance of survival. So far, so good.