Well, I think it may have been over due, but we put the newest Newbies in with the Ladies today! The only catch is that we haven’t expanded the run yet! I think it’ll be fine for a couple of weeks, though. We’ll get to it…just not right now 🙂
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| Hungry babies! |
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| Isn’t she pretty!? |
The Ladies and the Newbies pretty much stayed away from each other…they’re definitely two different flocks…but no one attacked anyone either, which is always a good sign 🙂 I think that having them together out in the yard a few times and having the brooder and the chicken run right next to each other gave them some time to get to know each other without being in each other’s faces.
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| Our 7 layers |
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| The 9 newest pullets |
The Newbies didn’t, however, make their way up into the roosting space tonight when the sun went down. Instead they’re sleeping on the ground level, tucked into a corner. We’ll have to help them figure out that there’s a second floor to the Chicken Mansion tomorrow. Silly pullets!
Now, have you noticed anything funny about any of the pictures? Yeah…that’s right…all that comb! I do believe we have ourselves a Little Man! Only one so far out of nine, which is awesome, but a rooster none-the-less.
LOL, I only hold information on my own need to know basis. I forget so much I drive myself nuts sometimes. I’ve even had to search my own website for things I’ve planted, because I forgot exactly what it was or I couldn’t remember if I planted it this year or last year. Even more scary is at the end of the day when my brain believes that I did something three days ago yet it was only that morning. LOL Yup, end of the day equals a brain fart for me. 🙂
LOL…I’m the same way! It’s like one piece of information pushes another piece out at the end of a long day 😉 Ah well, you can’t remember everything all the time! I am still in awe though 🙂
This whole chicken thing is so fascinating to me. I am still trying to determine if we maybe have a man in our bunch, but thus far it is too hard to tell. We have been debating if we should have gotten a rooster to help guard our flock. I wish I could help you out with your questions, but I am wondering the answers myself! LOL
You might wind up with a rooster still 🙂 In our first batch of 5 we had all girls, in our second batch of 4 we had one rooster and in this last batch of 9 it looks like we have one rooster…so you might have a little man in there to guard your flock after all 😉
Next time you get chicks, you can sex them by looking at the tips of their wings. Males will have straight forming feathers and females will have two layers of feathers forming on their wing tips growing at different intervals. I’ve never vented chicks or ducklings (don’t plan on it either), but I think checking feathers is a safe substitute.
We purchased our rooster Virgil last November with the hopes of expanding our flock, and we haven’t been disappointed with him in the least. He will always lay treats at the girls feet and will eat last. He isn’t protective of them around the ducks, since Betty is the alpha in the courtyard.
Betty is our black sex link. She looks a lot like your rooster, having a medium sized comb and long wattles. Our ameracaunas also have small combs.
Crowing…hmmm? What’s that? LOL Virgil CROWS ALL NIGHT AND ALL DAY! If we keep the windows shut, we can still hear him loudly. When we go outside the pitch is almost deafening to me. I’ve gotten used to it and still, even with all the crowing, I wouldn’t pot him up into a stew. He is just the sweetest thing ever. He was already grown we we bought him for $10 bucks, and it was money well spent. LOL He isn’t aggressive at all, and his quirky ways make us fall in love with him each day. I could go on for hours about Virgil…I never thought I’d be so attached to a rooster. 🙂
I live in an area zoned agricultural, so my neighbors don’t have much say about roosters or any other animal. Out here there are dogs howling all night, barking at nothing and being a bigger pain in the ass than our Virgil.
Ha! I love that you’ve named your rooster Virgil! Thanks for the feather tip! I will have to try that out next spring!
How do you hold so much information in your brain!?!? 😉
They are so cute! When ours got old enough to start being outside overnight, they had no idea where to go to roost too… we had to show them! Our roosters were quite lovely (the three we ended up re-homing) with one of them being ‘rooster-like’ from 7 weeks old (yep, he started crowing at 7 weeks old). Whilst the boys were protective during free ranging time, they never beckoned the girls over if they found a bug, or anything. They charged in and hoed into the food… certainly not gentlemen, like I hear roosters are supposed to be with their girls!! I’d like to keep a rooster at some point, but they are bloody noisy!
It really is amazing how different their personalities are from the chickens!!! And from each other for that matter 🙂 The noise issue is a definite factor…I guess we’ll just wait and see…
Hi BG! I have a rooster in a semi urban neighbourhood (albiet neighbours only on two sides) and we just asked their permission first and then said that if they were ever unhappy, to come to us and we would give him away. We’ve had him for a while now and crows as the sun rises. He is an Araucana and so far is quite gentle and observant.
RE the babies thing – we just remove all the eggs from the nest if we don’t want broody hens or babies. Although I did get him so that I could have some chicks… Maybe in spring!
Good Luck!
OH, it’s great to hear another positive rooster story! I think we’ll just have to wait and see how he does and assess. Our immediate neighbors I think would be OK with him, at least in theory (they’ve both said they would, but I’m not sure if he woke them up every morning they’d feel the same), but we’re surrounded on all sides, so I don’t know about the rest of the neighborhood…though I’d really love to be able to hatch our own little chicks!!!
Perfect timing on this post. I needed some good chicken news. I just got a visit from animal control. One of my neighbors called and complained about the smell from my coop. I think they want me to have to get rid of my hens. Good news is, there was no violation. The only smell is pine shavings and I am in 100% compliance with all the rules including having the coop 20′ from every fence. The officer even said my coop was cute and that she’d note my file that this was an unwarranted call. I’m still not happy, but hope a day or 2 will lessen the irritation.
Oh man! I’m sorry to hear about your neighbors! Silly people! I am happy to hear, though, that the officer sounds like she was pretty awesome! It sounds like there’s nothing to worry about as long as you’re in compliance. Maybe your neighbors just need some free eggs? That’s helped with ours, no doubt!
I do have to say though, that I’m glad we don’t have a “20′ from every fence” rule here or we couldn’t have chickens on our tiny lot! There are a few good things about living in a state that’s pretty backwards about a lot of things 😉