Four New Chicks

Betty Boop, a Crested Polish.

This weekend we brought home four new additions to the flock. We are hoping they are all pullets, since we really don't want a rooster. We chose four different breeds, and only one of them (the Ameraucana) is a breed we currently have.

On Saturday morning, the girls and I headed out to pick up one chick at Jax, a favorite farm and ranch store (M wanted a Crested Polish, but Jax was the only place that seemed to have them). She picked one out that will be black and white, with a fountain of feathers atop her head that will look a lot like Phyllis Diller's hat. She is a small, spunky chick, with a little poof on her forehead. M named her Betty Boop, and carried her out to the car in a small box.

We had planned to head up to Ranch-Way Feeds to pick up three others, and knew that they were having a chicken nutrition seminar. I wasn't sure we could stay for the seminar, because I didn't want Betty to get cold. But when we arrived, Ross at Ranch-Way showed us to a back room where there was a nice, cozy empty brooder where Betty could stay warm, tank up on water and food, and hang out for an hour while we went to the seminar.

Hazel, an Ameraucana.

Ranch-Way started out as a flour mill in the 1860s, then was turned into a feed manufacturer in the 1940s. It's been owned by the same family since the 1960s, and produces rations for everything from ducks and horses to musk oxes and elephants. They offer a 20 percent layer ration, which is the highest protein feed for poultry I've been able to find, with organic options, as well. I like that they are a local producer, and was so impressed with their customer service and range of products.

Nettie, a Buckeye.

The seminar was full, and really helpful. They gave us each a sample maintenance diet for poultry that works well in place of scratch. Scratch is relatively low in protein, and it tends to water down the calcium and protein in a hen's diet if she fills up on scratch instead of her layer ration. I am guilty of tossing out too much scratch to my hens. I don't generally offer scratch once the weather warms up, but do like to give it in the winter for warmth.

Rosemary, a Welsummer.

Once the seminar was over, we hurried back to pick up Betty, along with the other three chicks we'd reserved. We chose a Buckeye, a breed with Ohio roots, and the only American breed started by a woman--her name was Nettie Metcalf. We also brought home a Welsummer, who will lay dark red eggs, and an Ameraucana (or, more accurately, an Easter Egger) because we love Pip's blue eggs.

They are now happily settled and peep-peeping in the bathtub, under a heat lamp, and doing very well. They already seem to have distinct personalities and are providing entertainment for all of us. We'll look forward to integrating them into the big girl flock when they get bigger.

Poultry in Paradise

A chicken on the Hana Highway, running from a tourist (me) with a camera.

 

I had heard about the wild chickens on Hawaii’s island of Kauai, but as we planned our trip to the island of Maui, I wondered if we’d see any wild flocks. It was both funny and familiar to hear the egg song on our first morning there, when K opened the window.

            First we heard a crow that sounded like a juvenile cockerel, followed by that familiar bock-bock-bah-gock clucking over an egg’s arrival. Ah, a sweet Hawaiian breeze filtering through the window, carrying scents of plumeria and the tropics…and the sounds of a happy Hawaiian flock. Music to my ears.

            Over the next week, we saw hens, chicks, pullets, and roosters, completely oblivious to the fact that they’d won the chicken life lottery and spent their days roaming all over paradise. Not much in the way of predators other than dogs and… well… tourists.

            I wanted a photo for Coop & Cottage, but rarely had my camera at hand when we saw them. The one time that I did, we were driving along the road to Hana, and had stopped to switch seats (M was feeling a bit queasy on the windy road so I had her sit in front). We pulled into the little leafy widening in the road, and there was a small hen, happily scratching and picking through the leaves under a rainbow eucalyptus tree.

I got out with my camera and said “Hi henny, henny…” she seemed to look over her shoulder, a little like an islander wondering what that crazy tourist wanted. Then she walked faster, and faster, before breaking into a flat out OMG run. I grabbed one shot, and if you look closely you can see her beak open as if in disbelief.

Meanwhile other people in their cars were probably entertained. I know my daughters were.

All week, we saw them in unexpected places. We pulled into the small parking area for Iao Needle (a 1,200-foot tropical outcropping), and the park ranger told us the chickens were probably the most wildlife we’d see. The chickens we saw roaming in town, on beaches and in the upland areas were smaller than our domesticated birds. Most were shades of brown, looking a little like Welsummers or Ameraucanas. L wondered where they lay their eggs (we wondered if we’d come across a clutch, but never did).

            So, why are there so many chickens in Hawaii? On Govisithawaii.com this was one explanation:

            “Most people suggest that the feral chicken population can be traced back to when Hurricane Iniki hit Kauai in 1992. It’s been reported that the devastating hurricane destroyed a number of chicken farms.  Wikipedia also suggests another possible theory: ‘Others say that sugarcane plantation laborers in the late 1800s and early 1900s brought and raised chickens (for eating and cockfighting) and many got loose over the years and multiplied.’”

            They sound like reasonable explanations. But that’s not to say that all the chickens in Hawaii are wild, of course. At the Maui Swap Meet we went to, the girls were trying to talk me into getting a henna tattoo of a chicken, and the artist who did the tattoos said she has chickens in her yard all the time, but a neighbor owns them. With few predators, many non-feral chickens are able to free range in ways that my hens would only dream about.

            One evening at the house we were renting, I saw a black hen with about eight young chicks following her around along the property edge. I asked L to quickly take the camera and see if she could get some pictures of those wild chickens for me.

            She came back a short while later, trying not to roll her eyes at me. “Mom, those aren’t wild chickens. They live there. They have a coop.”

            The poor hen, looking a bit harassed, shepherded her family back into her yard, no doubt grumbling to her brood about tourists and their cameras.

            Yesterday, we returned home and I checked on our hens and let them out into the yard. It was a pretty nice afternoon, but I knew they had to get their free-ranging done by dark. The wind was picking up, and there were blizzard warnings calling for 10 inches of snow. 

Such is life as a Colorado chicken.

Meanwhile, I thought of those happy Hawaiian chickens foraging among hibiscus and eucalyptus, with mild 80 degree temperatures and soft ocean breezes. Talk about fowl weather.

           

Chicken Tracks with Yarn

Chicken Tracks (in Lovestick Sock Yarn, colorway "Woody").

Sometimes, my fascination with my hens spills over into other areas of my life. When I garden, I plan a few extra rows of mache greens for the ladies to snack on. Chickens have started springing up in my kitchen decor, on tea towels I've embroidered with vintage hen patterns, and on odd pieces of china and pottery. I found an old chicken feeder that makes a perfect rustic shelf at my potting bench.

And chickens work their way into my knitting as well. I've had some sock yarn in my stash for several years that I've come to think of as "Hen Feathers" as the colorway. I could have sworn that was the name on the skein, but I looked back into my stash records and it's actually a hand-dyed merino in a colorway called "Woody". Well, OK, that fits. But I'm still calling it Hen Feathers.

Anticipating a trip we're taking, I decided to cast on some socks, which are easily portable. Good for the plane, and for the beach. I looked through my magazines and books for a pattern, then through Ravelry.com's plethora of patterns. I came across one called "Simple Skyp Socks" from Adrienne Ku. Because the yarn colors are bold and varied, I wanted a simple pattern, and I wanted something that I could knit without having to be too focused. I think beach knitting is kind of like beach reading--you want something relaxing, fun, and not particularly challenging.

I cast on, and immediately loved the pattern and the yarn. It's a sportweight yarn, on size 2 needles, so it's knitting up quickly. But as I looked at it I decided--with all due respect to designer Ku--that I'd rename these socks "Chicken Tracks." The Skyp stitch Ku incorporated reminds me happily of the tracks my hens leave in the snow, or in the garden.

In a solid color, this pattern would be more defined and noticeable. And I may have to try a second pair in a solid colorway, but it works very nicely with a patterned yarn, bringing texture and depth of its own. I like how--like the chicken tracks in my garden--you don't see the Skyp stitch at first glance. It's there between the rows of knit and purl like Thelma's tracks winding their way through the rows of lettuce and cabbage.

I have set aside the socks for the time being. I turned the heel on the first one. At the rate I'm going, I'll have it finished before our trip, and I really want to be able to work on this later, when I can relax a bit. There I'll be, miles from the coop but called to my hens with the ins and outs of my knitting needles.

Up (and Down) to Old Tricks

Pip (right) as a youngster with the two Jaerhons. 

This weekend, the hens were in the small chicken yard, and the gates to the rest of the backyard were closed. The hens tend to clip the newly emerging grass very short, so we try to limit their lawn time when it's growing. But they will sometimes stand at the gate looking pitifully toward the yard. K says that if they had a tin cup to scrape along the fence bars, they would.

Yesterday I happened to look outside to check on them, and saw Pip, the foundling Ameraucana, perched on top of a rail, working up her courage to leap/fly to the top of the trellis. This made me laugh, because it was something that the Norwegian Jaerhons (Fliers Extraordinaire) had perfected and taught Pip.

Pip thinks she's a Jaerhon. She was raised together with the two smaller hens, and they were lighter-bodied and very adept at hopping to the top of the trellis and soaring down to the other side. Pip is what's called a large fowl -- she's a standard sized chicken and though not as big as some heavy-bodied chickens, she's about twice as heavy as the Jaerhons. Not really built aerodynamically like the Norwegian hens.

Still, she would watch them map their escape route, and when she was smaller she was able to follow easily. As she got bigger and heavier, flying wasn't quite as easy for her as it was for them, but she seemed to think she was one of them, and would gamely follow and worked very hard to keep up. She was ungainly, but determined, following along like a sumo wrestler mirroring the moves of two prima ballerinas.

After we moved the two Jaerhons out to the country where they could range a little more freely, Pip seemed to forget about the tricks they'd taught her. She stayed grounded with the rest of her flock for the last year.

Until yesterday, that is. I watched her. If you've ever seen someone working up the momentum and courage to take a big leap, that's what she looked like. She kept bouncing up and down, looking at the top of the trellis as if measuring her required lift. Finally, she gave a big push, lifted into the air just high enough to reach the top of the trellis and use it to push off and land on the other side. As she did, she made big clucking sounds like a kid yelling on his way down from the high dive.

Then she settled her wings, organized her tail feathers, and happily began pecking at the new grass.

Meanwhile, the other five hens stood at the gate, astonished and a bit peeved. If they could put their wings on their hips, they would have. But Pip completely ignored them, enjoying her freedom and thankful that she, unlike those big heavy chickens, was a Jaerhon and Ace flier.

A Loss in the Coop

Clover, posing on L's bike.

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When L called me at work yesterday, I knew something was wrong. “Mom, Clover died! I went out to gather eggs and she was in the coop.” Poor L. Such a shock to find that little feathered body lying still.

I was surprised. Clover had seemed perfectly fine the day before. I pictured the small, round hen.

When we gave my sister-in-law our hen-who-was-really-a-rooster, Cluck Norris, she had the girls each pick out a bantam hen to take home. They were probably a couple years old. L picked up a little barred-rock Bantam, named Clover; and M chose a silver laced Wyandotte, named Oreo.

Several days later, a mink slipped into my sister-in-law’s coop and killed the small Bantams that remained—easy prey because they didn’t roost high. Had we waited a week, Oreo and Clover would have been among the hens that were killed.             But they were safely ensconced in their new urban coop, country-chickens-turned-city-chickens, oblivious of their narrow escape. That summer, Clover was rocked and rocked on the glider, talked to, carried around, and doted on by L. We have photos of her in bicycle baskets, on pillows, in swings. We laughed because when the rest of the flock would be in another part of the yard, Clover would wander around confused, making woeful braaaahck sounds, wondering where her friends were. Somehow, she was always the hen left behind.

 I’ve written about her often, how she was a brave little hen who didn’t hesitate to spar with big Thelma, drawing her little self up as tall as she could. How our Dalmatian chased poor Clover under the house, where Clover wedged herself into the lattice under the porch until we rescued her. And Clover was one of the little hens who survived the theft of our big hens that cold evening in November.

 She’s had her share of close calls, has Clover. She was the hen who went to the fair, but refused to eat or drink until we relented and brought her home. As soon as she was back in her yard, with her flock, she perked right up.

We knew she was an older hen. She’d wasn't laying much, if at all, and that was OK. We didn’t have her because of her egg production.

Clover was one of L's favorites, and her passing leaves an empty space in the coop. Now, there are six. 

When I arrived home and gave L a hug, she said, “She was the best little hen.”

And she was. RIP Clover.

The Philosophy of Orchard Bees

Blue Orchard Bee. Photo courtesy CrownBees.com

I recently finished an article for Urban Farm magazine on the topic of Orchard Mason Bees.

          

 I’ve been trying to talk K into honeybees, without success. I did like the idea of harvesting honey, but found the idea of my own collection of pollinators to be a bigger part of the appeal.

            

Mason bees are benign (non-stinging), super-pollinators, native to the United States (honey bees are not), but they don’t produce honey. They are beneficial insects for anyone who has fruit trees and plants that benefit from pollination. One orchard mason bee can do the pollinating work of 100 honey bees. They can increase the cherry or apple yield by two to three times. They’re easy to house, and the more I learned about them, the more impressed I was.

            

One thing I found interesting was that when the female orchard bee lays her eggs (each with its own little provision pack of pollen) she lines them up and compartmentalizes them in a tube or reed. She may lay about six eggs per tube, lined up with female-to-be eggs in the back, and males-to-be toward the front. The males emerge first in the spring (and are slightly expendable), and hang around waiting for the females to emerge. The males live only long enough to breed, while the female does all the housekeeping and egg-laying for her specific tubes, then dies after about six weeks.

            

But the new bees’ emergence isn’t a matter of gestation, it’s a matter of temperature and timing. And this is what I think is really crafty of these industrious little insects: They emerge when the temperature is around 55 degrees which, coincidentally, is when the first of the fruit trees begin to bloom and make pollen available.

            

Sometimes the careful evolutionary engineering of nature is just a little breathtaking. It’s as if you can catch glimpses of the fingerprints of a master plan. Everything is interconnected and fits together.

            

That web is beautiful, whether spun of the carefully timed emergence of hard working bees, or the practicality of hens who act as natural pest control. This time of year, winter stills the garden and the interconnected threads are a little harder to see. But they are there, below the surface: Those small bees, nestled in a straw-like tube, are tucked away for winter, waiting, just as the fruit trees lie dormant, though it doesn’t appear that anything at all is happening.

            

This, I think, is a reminder to me to be patient. I am always anxious this time of year for winter to be moving along, seed catalogs to arrive and spring to return. Sometimes, though, when it doesn’t seem like anything is progressing, there is perfection unfolding beneath the surface. The point is to take pleasure in the stillness and steadiness. 

            

Ah, the philosophy of orchard bees. Monumental and miniscule at the same time.

(Special thanks to Dave Hunter for the information about the bees. You can learn more at his web site, CrownBees.com.)

Day and Night

As seasons have changed, we've been a little late getting our lights in the coop, and it has really thrown the hens for a loop (hey, a bonus rhyme!).

Is it day or is it night?

With days getting shorter, the chickens have slowed down on egg production, but by extending the hours of light they get we can ramp up their egg laying for summer-like production. Last year, we tried a red heat lamp and thought maybe it would provide enough light for their chicken brains to be tricked into laying more eggs. Some hens produced fairly well last winter, but we had four young pullets who weren’t producing yet anyway, so it wasn’t really a good measure. I did read that a red light won’t provide the stimulation that a white light will.

I liked having that heat lamp up in the coop for really cold days, though most poultry people will tell you that your chickens don’t need the heat. In fact, there is the chance that they won’t be acclimated as well to the cold when you have a heat lamp in the coop, and a power outage during frigid weather could be disastrous for your flock.

So I hemmed and hawed over what kind of light to hang in the coop.

The hens have not been laying much lately. Thelma and Pip have been pretty regular, but one to two eggs a day from seven hens just seemed a bit on the skimpy side. I really hate buying eggs at the store when I’m feeding my own suppliers.

This year we decided to try just putting a white light in the coop, on a timer that would extend the day a few more hours. But we should have hung it earlier in the fall for a more gradual adjustment.  For the last month or so, the hens have been heading for the coop early – sometimes at 3:00 or 4:00 in the afternoon – even though it was light a little longer.

Last week, K tacked up the light and set the timer for it to come on from 5:30 to 9:00 pm. It’s a very bright light. It’s like someone is going to be interrogated. 

I went out to shut the coop the first night the light was on, and realized that the hens were confused. Inside their coop, it was daylight. So they went out into the yard, expecting daylight there as well, but it was dark. They saw me, and crowded around, tentatively looking for treats. But I could sense bewilderment clouding their feathered features. If they had dialogue balloons above their heads, they’d have looked like this:

?  or ?!

“Silly hens,” I said to them. “It’s bedtime.” I shooed them into the coop and they looked uncertain.

The next morning I found eggs scattered around the coop as if they were surprised by this sudden development—“OH my! An egg!” The rest of the week, I found myself feeling like the grand manipulator, because instead of one or two eggs each day, we were suddenly getting five a day. The light was definitely making a difference.

But evenings were still confusing to them. They’d head into the coop as normal, get all roosty and ready for bed, then the light would come on and out they’d go, bleary eyed as if the night had passed really quickly and they hurried out to meet the day. Poor things didn't know what to think.

I’d see them milling around in front of the gate. I could almost hear the conversations:

“I thought you said it was morning?”

“It was—you saw how bright it was.”

“But now it’s dark.”
“I know. It’s the darnedest thing. It’s like someone keeps turning the sun on and off.”

“That’s impossible.”

“I know, I know! Right?!”

And so I go out and shoo their confused and disgruntled selves into the coop, again. Note to self for next year: Be more gradual with our sudden substitute sunshine.