Freedom rangers
25 of them and they all made it through the bowels of USPS. As I introduced them to their new living quarters, I dipped their beaks into the water so they knew where it was right away. They were all quite thirsty traveling all the way from Pennsylvania.
We ordered them from Freedom Ranger Hatchery (have a link), they were excellent to deal with.
Machetes have a bad rep,
but they can clear some serious bush.
This whole area was reclaimed along with the ancient logging road leading to it. This is where the chicken coop will go, rotating the fenced-in area for the chickens with the garden each season.
I wish I had a picture of what it looked like before.
All fixed with a few finishing touches
All it’s missing now is a window but I’ll wait until after we moved the coop to its new location in a couple of weeks.
Bear
That sac of shit ripped open the coop like a can of tuna, -1 chick :
A day working in the rain later, it’s structurally sound again.
Reinforced the front panel & added extra locking throughout.
Painting will have to wait for more clement weather.
New place to hang out in
The chicks still fit through the fence which is a problem since they’re getting chased by the big chickens. We can’t keep them in the coop all the time so here’s their new protection/containment.
This will be used as shelter during the warm days by the meat birds.
The pecking order
We introduced the chicks to the 4 grown up chickens today. They shared the same quarters for weeks now and were able to get used to each other. Of course the big ones went immediately after the small ones to establish the pecking order.
It always breaks my heart but that’s the way it is. All I do is make sure one of them doesn’t get all the attention. Natural as it is, I’m still angry towards the big ones, especially considering they too were small before. I can’t help but grab a plastic rake and establish my pecking order if they go too hard on them. This has the double advantage of satisfying my need for justice while reinforcing my place at the very top of said order. All the chickens respect the crap out of me now and make way around me. That’s right, I’m the alpha-chicken!
Which is good because Rhode-Island reds are not shy at all which causes problems when locking them up every night among other things. It’s a healthy reminder that they are on the wrong end of the plastic rake.
No pics or video, I was too busy containing this ruckus.
And this is what happens once they figured it out
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This is what happens as chicks learn to lay down
[flv:http://ben.akrin.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/birds.flv 640 426]
They spend the first few days of their lives standing; little by little they figure out they don’t have to and look like a bunch of sleepy drunks in the process.
8 Buff Orpingtons
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[flv:http://ben.akrin.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/chicks02.flv 640 426]
Chicken patio
Seems like Rhode Island Reds refuse categorically to have anything to do with the snow. I kinda felt bad that they were staying inside all day so I made them a little patio with the help of my sister. It’s removable and will be extended upon next season.
Chicken cam – back online!
But with a serious loss of functionality. Given the internet connection that I have (cellular) I can’t reasonably set it up to do live streaming. I’ve also disabled interaction with the cam. What’s left is an image uploaded every hour. Not super duper cool but I’ll take what I can get in this neck of the woods.
Hopefully this will get better when better internet is available.
Chicken Coop!
It’s been over a year since our move away from the city and we’re finally getting back into chickens. Things take time, starting fresh at the other end of the country doesn’t happen overnight. We only got 5 layers as we’re pretty late in the season, we’ll start meat birds next spring.
The coop still needs some polish and a window but here it is in all its current glory:
With a bunch of Rhode-Island Reds
Works for toddlers as well
As with the beehive, I drafted everything on Google Sketchup and it made building it completely devoid of surprises. The plan can be downloaded here.
Chicken cam
As part of my CCTV installation at home, a cam is placed in the chicken coop. This has very little direct purpose although it is fun to watch chicken behaviors with no humans around. And I guess it is nice to check if we have eggs or if everything is all right.
Really, this is an experiment towards what our future farm will be like. We’d like for people to be able to watch how their food is grown. Maybe even interact remotely with the animals.
It’s a little slow due to my 3Mbps connection and the proxying but have fun with it:
The chicken cam has been disabled as we get ready to move to a new state.
A year a and half after our big jump, it has been re-enabled 🙂
