Vibrant Thoughts

Chicken coops can be made of found debris or carefully purchased materials or ordered from the internet as a kit to assemble. I love the found stuff idea and even had a plan in mind for making a coop under our deck but I got stuck thinking about how to make such a dwelling safe from predators.

Then I saw The Coop of my dreams!

My chicks would love such a coop. “Oh, the expense!” However, I did want to show it to Jim and he said, “Would that make a good birthday present?” Why yes, it would (even if my birthday is 6 weeks away and the chicks will need their coop before that)!

So I ordered the coop and started to plan where to put it. With the chicks still happily pooping in their crate on the dining room table,

I could hardly imagine relegating them to the back yard where I could see them without a trip downstairs! So, I investigated the little bit of land outside our dining room. The backdrop is a fence overgrown with ivy, but I could see that reclaiming the land would actually work.

Next came waiting patiently while the rain stopped and finally, that day arrived. Actually a whole week of sunshine was predicted. I was a little overwhelmed by the black and white directions I printed so I printed them again in color. Things were a little clearer.

Over the next three days, I hacked away the jungle and assembled the coop. It’s perfect sitting there outside the dining room!

Today, the chicks get their first outing for the hour that the sun hits the coop! Can’t wait.

I took this video seconds after I added a “practice” roost to the chix crate.

I swear those babies grow right before our eyes! I got worried that one of the black chicks was possibly a rooster and spent hours researching about her, finally to be relieved — she’s a girl.

What’s it like to have four baby chicks living on your dining room table? Well, I sit there and read while eating breakfast and lunch. They seem to enjoy that because they watch me through the plastic crate they live in for a few more days! Yikes, they’ll need a bigger box soon.

No one walks through our dining room without a little peek at them, and they often respond with their sweet little peeps. You might wonder just how many people walk through our dining room? That’s a reasonable question. This time of year, lots of people come to our house for rehearsals for the Jazz and Pop concert. Penny simply can’t resist and Penny’s friends have little kids who want to see the chicks. These chicks are really getting acclimated to people!

During the first few hours I kept checking to see if they were breathing; just as I did when my daughters were born! Now, I trust these tiny creatures to breathe on their own. Isn’t it amazing that at birth they stand and walk and find the feeder and waterer. I hear they often need a little help learning to drink; ours came already drinking, but I did watch carefully to see that each one of them took those little sips and then tilted her head back making a kissy movement as she swallowed. It’s so adorable!

Marlowe, our shared dog has been fabulous. Sometimes he pays attention to the cheeping, but mostly he hangs around me. When we have visitors who are cooing at the babies, he gets a little jealous and whines and tries to look at them too. I think he really enjoys the extra attention he gets and to be honest, he’s giving me more attention too, just so I don’t forget him.

All-in-all, it’s a lovely process and I look forward to being able to take them outside in another week or so. By then, the new coop will have arrived and we can confine them in the run. Of course, we still have to decide where the coop will go and then put it together. This is something I love doing, so I can hardly wait for FedEx to show up. Tomorrow.

Whatever possessed me to think I could go look at the chicks and not take them home? When I was confronted with the info that all the hatcheries in the country are out of chicks (it’s Easter!) I decided not to wait for the exact kind I wanted and to buy these little beauties.  That’s Ping drinking water, Beak Habib hiding behind the feeder, and Watson and Crick hunkering down with the chick crumble.

What have I learned already? Baby chicks are adorable. I got the chickens as much for their presence as for their eggs. They are a lure to get people to oooh and aaah. And that’s the first thing I notice about how backyard chickens can improve health. There’s nothing like a kitty, a puppy, or a box of chickies to reduce stress and help people get in touch with what’s really important in life!

Penny and I remembered all the equipment needed to have a brooder: water and feed distribution, wood shavings, and a heat lamp. We came home loaded and full of good cheer. I bought the quintessential book on raising chickens and did a quick brush up on new chick info. We were lucky. These chicks already knew how to eat and drink – after all they had been competing with 200 other sisters for two days before we brought them home.

The only unknown is whether we got a rooster. That’s a no no in an urban environment and apparently determining the sex of a baby chick isn’t an exact science. We know from the breeds that three of them are girls. The only one in doubt is Crick. Funny, she’s the littlest on and she’s a Jersey Giant!

Well, that’s the news from Hale’s Not-Even-an-Acre. More to come.