The Chicken Scoop 5/24

 Catchy little title, don't you think? ;)

So, here's our cute little barn.

 

Just last night, Lige finished our official chicken coop inside a quarter of our cute little barn.

 Look at all the room in there...plenty of space for 31 chickens.

Look how plump and juicy, I mean happy, they look in there.

How do you transport 31 full grown chickens across the property to a new coop?  Well, if you are Lige and I you wait until 11pm, so it's good and dark and you can't see anything.  At least one of us wore a headlamp.  (Lige.)  Then we reached boldly into the brooder box and pulled out a chicken.  These meaties have come to realize that our hands mean food, so they were not afraid of us.  Until we scooped one up and it started squawking and flapping.  Then the others ran and hid under the covered part of the brooder box.  That didn't phase us one bit.  Armed with a shovel to usher them from the back into our waiting hands, we grabbed 'em up.  At first we just carried one at a time.  But that was going to be A LOT of trips back and forth.  So we started taking two at a time, each.  There's a learning curve on how to handle chickens.  We learned it quickly, after just a trip or two.  We are now chicken handling pros, so if you ever need someone to transfer your chickens, feel free to give us a call.  ;)

Here's a look at our indoor chickens.  They've grown a lot, too, but at a much slower rate than the meat birds.

Well, Hello there, Miss Marple!

This is Chanticleer, formerly known as Beatrice.  Yep, she turned out to be a dude.  Since Lige named this one before, he also got to choose it's rooster name.  So Chanticleer it is.  :)  We haven't decided if we will eat Chanticleer or let him do his rooster thing.  If he stays nice, we'll keep him around.  

Ah, lovely Miss Quizzle.  Miss Quizzle and Tricksie (not pictured) are my new favorites.  They come right up to me and love to be petted.  Tricksie will even lay down when I rub her back.  I shall call her Tricksie and she shall be mine and she shall be my Tricksie.  (Surely you've seen "Finding Nemo"?)

And yes, we still have Brown Leghorns.  They are flighty and skittish and I still can't tell any of them apart.  They jump away and try to escape when I try to pet them.  They do, however, love my wedding ring and try to eat it.  Here's one of them.  We'll call her Joy.  One of them has been named Joy...usually it's whichever one is closest.  Maybe it's better to say that they are ALL named Joy!