10 weeks!

The chickens are 10 weeks old this past Saturday. They are getting so big. We are hoping {fingers crossed}that we have all pullets (young hens/females) and no cockerels (roosters/young males). Raven, the black colored chicken, makes a certain noise very often and I am hoping that it isn't the signs of early crowing. We were told all of our chickens are females but you don't know for sure until later on. We are not allowed to have roosters in Parma Heights due to the noise factor. They are very noisy and come on, who wants to be woken up really early, especially on the weekends. Not me. But if it turns out we do have a rooster on our hands, its possible we are going to keep it until someone complains. Or we could get a no crow collar. Its kind of like a bark collar for dogs. I cannot make this up if I tried....
http://nocrowroostercollars.com/

Feeding Daisy. She always hops up on your lap...their claws/nails are starting to hurt when they dig into your leg.

Our corn is finally growing. We only have one row of it this year. Last year we had a lot and the squirrels destroyed it. They loved it but we didn't even get to try it.

 

Yes, we are those crazy people who deocorate our chicken coop. We saw this sign at a garage sale and we had to have it. I love the baby chicks in the rearview mirror..lol

 

Daisy walking around the extra area Tim fenced in. We decided to give them a little more space outside of the run.

Raven snuck into the garden. The other chickens were jealous

In this picture, you can see that Raven's wattles are starting to grow (underneath her mouth). If you look towards the back of this picture, you can see the extra area Tim fenced in.



Sitting in the chicken coop can be really peaceful at times

 

 

Fixing Up the Place

I decided that it would be cool to fix up the place a little bit. Who wants a boring coop, right?I am glad that Tim decided to go along with my crazy ideas. 

Every coop needs to have a home sweet home sign in it. 

It also needs to have a family pic hanging in it! 

I never thought I would have so much fun with this chicken coop. I love trying to come up with ways to decorate it. I'm sure I will be adding many more

First night in the Coop!

The chicks spent their first night in the coop on Friday, 7/17. They were very scared at first. So scared that we could hear them chirping when we were standing at the back door in our house. We ended up stringing a strand of Christmas lights in the coop and it seemed to settle them down. They do not like the dark. Tim went out the next morning and opened the pop door (the little door to the coop) and they came running out all excited. I think they are really going to like the coop/run area.

Avery is still scared of the chickens. She does not like them near her feet. When we go in the coop, they come right over to us, thinking we have treats. Besides live worms that we dig up, their favorite treat right now is grapes. Theyl ike them even more than the dried mealworms. It is so cute to watch them chase each other around

I painted a sign for the outside of the coop. I think it turned out pretty well. I also wanted to include the chickens' names. As we get more chickens, we can add their names to the sign. Chicken math is real people..chickens are addicting.
Here is a little about chicken math..
http://www.homeontheroost.com/chicken-math/

Outline of the coop sign

How cute are they?

They look like they are in a police lineup. They are always up to something.

 

Fluffy is looking a little rough in this picture but she seems to be the one growing the fastest. I thought she had an infection on face, below her beak but then I realized its probably her wattles that are started to form. (It's hard to see in this picture)

 

Avery likes the chickens from a distance, when they aren't near her feet

Me with the chicks. They are getting so big!

Fluffy is trying to show you her wing span. They now love to jump and try to fly.

Tim with the ladies.

Painting their names

The finished sign hung up :)

 

Tim made this feeder out of PVC pipes

 Notice the Christmas lights? We are currently using pine shavings because we have them leftover from when the chickens were in the brooder (little tote) but I think we will be switching to sand. I heard a lot of good things about sand in a coop.

 

I love our coop! My niece said it best. She said I wouldn't be able to have this without Uncle Tim because he is so handy. She is absolutely correct. Thanks Tim!

 

 

 

 

 

The Early Bird(chicken) Gets the Worm

The chickens are getting so big so fast. They are now 5 weeks old. Besides a few finishing touches, Tim is done with the coop. We ended up placing the chickens in the coop while we cleaned their plastic tote out. They were a little scared at first but seemed ok. Then the next day we put them in the coop for a few hours. They are getting more and more comfortable in there and they really seem to enjoy it. They loved it when Tim turned over some dirt with a shovel, exposing worms and bugs. They went nuts. One would grab a worm and run and the others would chase after the one with the worm. They were really fun to watch.

They aren’t really scared of us anymore and will walk right up to us. They still aren’t thrilled when they are picked up but we will get there some day. I went into the coop the other day with flip flops on and Avery thought it was hilarious that they were pecking at my feet. She didn’t find it funny when she was standing there and they started coming up to her though.

Next post I will try to get some pictures of the finished coop. 

We have already made a few modifications to the coop. We hung a bottle of hand sanitizer up because they are salmonella machines and we ended up placing a lock on the inside of the coop door. The reason for this is because when you walk in the coop, the door swings open a bit and we are scared the dogs will open the door and come in. We wanted to make sure the door stays closed when we are in the coop.

 Speaking of dogs, Chewie is now the one I am scared of with the chickens. He didn’t care about them when they were in the tote upstairs but when they are in the coop, he whines and scratches at the door and tries to pull it open with his claws. I am trying to praise them when they are sitting there being good. They love watching them. They are so happy, they are smiling…see! This is how they look when they watch the girls.

So Big!

The chickens will be 5 weeks old this weekend. They are getting SOOO big so fast.  We decided to give them some treats this week. Chickens can eat pretty much anything but if you give them something besides their normal chicken feed, they will need gravel/grit to help digest it because they don't have teeth. When chickens are free ranging and outside, you don't normally need to give them any additional grit because they will pick up little rocks and stones. But since our chickens are currently restricted to a small plastic tote indoors, they don't have the opportunity to get rocks.

You can read all about how a chicken digests its food here:
http://scoopfromthecoop.nutrenaworld.com/tag/how-does-a-chicken-digest-food/

We decided to start off with some cut up grapes. Raven LOVED them and went crazy the first day she had them. We then bought some freeze dried meal worms. All of the girls loved these. They were eating them right out of our hand. We have been giving them some treats each time we come to visit them and play with them. They now seem to get excited when we come in the room (most likely because they know they will get treats). Tim is so close to being down with the coop. The girls are going to love it.

Our niece, Kaitlin, holding Fluffy.

Next up is Raven. Kaitlin was praying Raven wouldn't poop on her shoulder.

Tim, holding Fluffy. It was cute because Avery kept trying to give the chickens baby toys to play with.

Eating some grapes..notice the girt in the small plastic cup.

Here is the grit and the meal worms that we have been giving the girls. The meal worms are a big hit.

Scarlett is the biggest fan of the chickens. She is crazy about them...almost too crazy.

 

 

 



Did we get an ostrich?

Look at the neck on this girl! It is so long!

Things have been going pretty well with the chickens. They are growing like weeds. Every day they are looking  bigger and bigger. We decided to have Tim make a cover out of chicken wire and some boards for their tote because I think they will be trying to jump out soon. I also wanted a cover to protect them from our two dogs and two cats. We have the chickens in our upstairs spare bedroom and when we open the door, all of the dogs and cats run up the stairs ahead of us. I was worried that they would get to the chickens before us and by the time we get up there, there would be no chickens left. I still would never leave the chickens alone with the dogs and cats but I am much more comfortable now that we have a cover.

A couple more weeks and they will be able to go into the new coop Tim built for them. I am so excited. They are going to love exploring in there and in their new run. 

Daisy and Fluffy exploring the bedroom

Little Miss Daisy

Chickens? In the City?

We live in a small suburb of Cleveland, OH where houses are on top of each other. We currently have a 2 1/2 year old daughter (born at 25 weeks..her journey can be viewed: HERE), 2 dogs and 2 cats but I felt like we were missing something. A while back  I mentioned to my husband,Tim, that I wanted chickens. Fast forward a few months and Tim had a plumbing job at his sister’s brother in law’s house. They live in Cleveland and have a few chickens. They gave Tim some eggs to try. He said they were delicious and much better than any store bought eggs. And that, my friends, was the day we agreed to get chickens.

Tim started building the chicken coop this week. We decided to go to the nursery and look at chicken supplies. We went to Grace Brothers Nursery in North Royalton but they only had 8 week old and older chickens. If we were going to do this, we wanted to get them young to socialize them. They mentioned that their other store in Cleveland had younger chicks there. We drove there, walked in and saw a huge tub filled with a bunch of two week old chickens and fell in love. They were so cute and all your heard was “peep peep”. Avery was pointing at them and seemed very interested.

Look at how cute they are!

We weren’t planning on buying chickens that day but ended up with 3 of them. It is ok that Tim isn’t done with the coop yet because these chickens have to be kept under a heat lamp for a few more weeks. They will be spending the next month, in a plastic tote with a heat lamp, in our upstairs spare bedroom. Avery is very interested and tries to reach in the tote to touch the chicks. When I ask her if she wants to pet one, she shakes her head no. When I pick one up and hold it by her, she walks in the opposite direction. I think she will come around when she feels like it. The biggest fan of the chickens is our dog, Scarlett. She is so interested and sits with her feet up on the tote, peering over the edge to catch a glimpse.

They had three different types of chickens there so we got one of each kind. He said each of them are friendly and hardy breeds which will be good for the winter/summer.

Black Jersey- This chick is currently black and grey but when fully grown will have black, almost iridescent green feathers. We named this one Raven.

Buckeye- This chick is currently  brown but will turn mahogany color with black tail feathers when it gets older. Her name is Daisy.

White Plymouth Rock- This chick is currently yellow but will turn completely white when fully grown. Kaitlin and Eddie named her Fluffy.

It takes about 16 weeks before a chick can lay an egg so they will hopefully start laying before Thanksgiving. All of the varieties that we got produce brown eggs.

If he didn’t have it before, Tim now has motivation to finish the coop quickly. Tim is a saint. He really is. I am being super picky with this coop (even though I haven’t even hammered in one nail) and he is being very patient with me. We are looking online to get some hints (such as making the nesting boxes removable for easy cleaning and putting down a poop strip where they will roost).

I decided to write a blog to document our journey. Maybe it will encourage others to raise chickens, even if you are like us and don't have a big yard.

 We are super excited about this new adventure!

We are going to give these gals a good home.

Avery is excited about the chickens

She tries to grab but but doesn't want to touch them (if that makes any sense)

Tim holding Daisy for Avery to see

Raven

Daisy

Fluffy

Everyone trying to see

 Scarlett is the most excited about them