Saved by the....chick?

The other day, Brianna and I visited a farmer friend of mine. It was a short visit, but we got to see and hold his new meat chicks just a day old. He gave me great ideas by showing me his water setup for the chickens with watering fountains. We got to cuddle friendly barn kitchens and visit with his young calves. He even sent me home with some of his vegetable garden bounty (beets, lettuce and 2 different garlic cloves) all of which have been yummy and flavourful and baby lilac shoots of an unusual to me purple lilac that I can't wait to see grow up and flower in a year or 2. I even got to see his workshop and studio.

The main reason for our visit was to pick up a dozen of his 1 1/2 year old cull hens. He replaces his laying hens every year for peak egg production for his farmgate sales. I had been thinking of replacing the laying hens I originally got about 4 years ago, because egg production has been really down and unpredictable. I had added a few new chickens along the way: some Americaunas for blue eggs, silkies for brooding and hatching and those few chickens that have been hatched by the silkies. The "new" chickens required that I clean out the coop, old chickens and all. I should have had it all organized and done for the Friday when I picked up the hens, but of course it wasn't. They've been housed temporarily in the little shelter next to the sheep, with the lambs poking their curious noses through the mesh.

Today was clean-up day. I started with the roosters, which I have had too many of because the silkie hen mainly hatched roosters. I decided to keep one rooster (he's 1 year and he looks very nice). As I was looking around for the next victim, I heard a little peep. I've had an old hen get broody a while ago and rather than chase her off, I decided to let her try since I had been too busy with lambing and shearing the sheep to bother much about my unproductive layer flock. She's been sitting on several eggs and when I lifted her up, there was a little chick still wearing half a shell. It is yellow with black markings and looks like an Americauna...here's hoping its a hen.

The old hen still had 7 eggs under her. I love chicks and I especially love hens that raise their own chicks, so this old girl will be saved. I found my rabbit house and run I built a few years ago and decided that it would do great for a broody hen and her chicks. I set about cleaning it up and getting it ready. When I went to retrieve the hen, her chick and the eggs, I noticed there was another hen in there with her. She is 1 of 3 cream coloured hens I got as ready to lay, from a friend of Hugh's this past winter. 2 of them have decided about a month ago that they would be wild chickens and have literally flown the coop (5 foot fencing). They did it enough times, that I got tired of having to chase them down every night to return them. I've since seen them roost in the cedar trees in the ram's pasture and they come running to me in the morning for their feed. I have to hunt down their eggs, but they are generally down to 2 places. They actually look great, better than before when the 3 roosters would gang up on them. The 3rd girl, a very little hen, didn't have the same need to escape. Looking at the eggs under the old hen, they mainly belong to her, although its the old hen that's been taking care of them. Today, this little hen was trying to be part of the brood. She was cuddled up under the old hens wings, probably drawn there by the peeping chick. I've set up the old hen in the rabbit house by herself with the chicks and remaining eggs. Hopefully, I'll see another chick hatched by morning.

Since the little cream coloured hen is still laying, I'll keep her as well. She'll join another keeper hen, a gorgeous black girl born here about 2 years ago, because she's been laying beautiful blue eggs lately. I'll clean out the coop tomorrow and move the "new" laying hen flock in with the black hen, the 1 saved rooster and the 3 small cream coloured wild hens. Hopefully everything will go well and everyone will be healthy.

Below: Clio was very interested in the little chick as we checked up on her, and then too interested as she tried to reach in to get a good sniff. Mama hen just ruffled her feathers as we quickly closed her up safely.

New Pasture

Finally, Hugh and I buckled down and finished off fencing the front yard to create a sheep pasture. We've only done the perimeter and the run coming from the back where the back pastures and sheep shed are located. It took over 1000 feet of page wire fencing, 110 cedar posts of varying sizes and about 25 lbs. of fencing staples on the hottest couple of days since the summer began. Our alarm rang at sun-up and we'd get up shortly after that to try and beat the midday heat and we'd go back out in the evening after supper. We made several mistakes, but have learned from them and in the end, the fence will still work and do its job. We still have to make the interior fences to separate it into 4 paddocks so I can accomplish proper pasture rotation. The perimeter fencing requires a lot of finishing work yet: splicing joins and securing wire ends, making gates, and anchoring corner posts (which should have been done before attaching the page wire), but it is functional for now.

The sheep have been allowed to move in for about an hour last night and they were funny to watch. They took a while at the entrance eating some longer grass that didn't manage to get cut earlier this week. Then they continued walking as a herd along the fence line, even sticking their heads through the fence...the nerve! I guess the grass really is greener on the other side!!! Then they'd take off, back down the run to the shed in the back. They did this in smaller herds repeatedly...almost as if they wanted to make sure they knew the way back or that they could still get back. I'm being careful to ease them into a nice grassy pasture, because if they overdose on the grass, they could bloat and die. I'm feeding them their normal hay and will be allowing them increasing amounts of time in the front pasture to get their stomachs used to it all.

I found the sheep looked so small in that huge large field. I joked to Hugh that I need more sheep to fill in the space. Brianna said that we needed a horse or 2. I'd like a jersey cow!!! I was a bit worried about how to get them all back into the sheep shed at night, but I got Shepherd Aidan to enter the run with the pans of grain and move to the top of the field calling them and shaking the pans. They all ran right back and followed him "home". It was wonderful to watch. I was looking at all the work that's been done recently and in past years and our house and gardens in the glow of the evening sun and I felt very happy and content. Things are looking good. The farm is shaping up. We are setting down some pretty big roots on this farm and I'm feeling hopeful about my dreams and wishes for this place.