Cute coop!

Smart start.  Finally, a fam-friendly house for your little feathered friends.  Now those in urban settings can enjoy fresh eggs, too. 

Homegrown and Very Happy

Thinking about chillin' with a chicken?  Excellent.  They are, without a doubt, the easiest pet you’ll ever encounter.  A little food.  Vegetable scraps from the kitchen.  Fresh water.  A place to perch.  A cage to protect them from predators.  And you’re good to go.

Free range, fresh eggs are remarkable.  You’ll never ever want to eat store bought again.  Ever.  My friend, SB, concurs.  She called to say that she was saving today’s collection because they’re so beautiful. Wait until she actually cracks one open.  Susan will never go back. Unbelievably colorful yolks/great flavor.  Dave wants to tell you that the white is much better as well.  “It doesn’t run, like your nose, as does the store-bought variety.”  Simply superior.  He’ll be delighted, I’m sure, that I shared that.

Who knows how my/our journey with chickens began.  The same genes that prompted my mother to pick me up from school with a goat in the car apparently made its way to this generation.  While I never had chickens as a child, we did have almost everything else.  In a very small yard.   

Meet Stormy, my pet pigeon. I tied a string to his leg so he could fly.  But not away.  Poor bird.

And there was Puff /with her back to the camera/ our first dog other than Trixie who was given to Aunt Lil and Uncle Mont.  I never got the straight story about why what was once My Christmas Present was given away.  But I loved the fact that Aunt Lil and Uncle Mont had her as their only “child.”  I also had an imaginary friend named Silly.  We set a place at the table for her each night. Then one day my mom said that Silly was dead.  This, I would imagine, was not a good day for me. 

A new friend commented after reading a recent blog entry, “You can't make this stuff up!”

Yep, Silly apparently bit the dust one day in Park Forest, Illinois.  I’m sure Mom just got sick of setting the table and decided to have one less at dinner that night.  I wasn’t an easy child.  I stuck my foot in a manhole cover and they needed to call the fire department to extricate me.  I remember climbing out the window and running down the street with my mattress/not an easy feat.  And ultimately I hopped on a plane in the middle of the night to fly from Miami to Illinois to be with the love of my life, Dave. And to go to college.  

I returned home to Florida many, many years later.  That will be another days’ writing. In short, I gave my mom a run for her money.  We also need to discuss the Enneagram one day because that explained a LOT about our relationship.  I’d buy David Daniels book now/it could change your life. That will be another discussion but if you can't wait/I wouldn't/then look on the BOOKS, ETC. section.  

I’m finding it hard to contain my laughter reading this to Dave, the love of my life, because it so shows you what ADHD is like.  It’s a gift.  But I better get back to the chickens. 

When the boys were little, I purchased an incubator and fertile eggs.  We marked an X on each so that all the kids in the neighborhood could shuffle them around several times a day much as a mother hen would do.  Twenty one days later, a miracle.  Chicks emerging from their shells.  Remarkable! The adults were astonished/we thought the event was lost the kids.  Not at all.

So now that you're totally taken with the idea, where to find your first chicks?  DO NOT order them by mail.  I think that is far too cruel.  Can you imagine being put in a box and shipped USPS?  Not good.  If you live in the SF Bay Area, Half Moon Bay Feed and Fuel always carries babies/assuming you don’t want to go the incubator route.  Otherwise, Google a source in your area.  I’ve since found breeders who handle Stunningly Special varieties. Very well priced/as in under $10.

Chickens last around seven years.  Don’t become too attached.  Or do.  But be willing to deal with death every so often.  And add babies to your flock periodically to keep the eggs coming/production dwindles as they age.  We currently have twelve or so.  And there's a rooster in there who has kept his lips zipped until now.  Wouldn't it be fun to let some of the eggs hatch?  We've never done that.

Just be thankful that I eliminated the rest of this blog.  Can you imagine? 

 I can.

And so can Dave.