Let’s Talk Chickens

Today was time to clean out the coop. It gets kind of messy and the husband was thinking it was getting smelly. Hot summer days will do that. Our girls are broody and messy. They frequently poop into their food bowl and they love digging around on the floor of their yard. I try and keep the water and food bowls clean by changing them out every other day. We need to come up with a better method because most people talk about changing theirs every few days to a week.



I brought Gizmo with me because she’s cute and adorable and was begging me to take her outside. She loves to spend time out in the sun. She also thought it was pretty fun to watch me wrangle the chickens and scoop poop.





I armed myself with some rubber gloves and scooped the old pine bedding into a bucket then dumped it into the compost. I started a new compost pile for the chicken stuff. Then I filled it back up with fresh pine shavings. The chickens were really happy about this. They ran around in the coop while I clean up the yard a bit. I added more mulch and sprinkled this compost granule stuff. It’s supposed to keep everything clean and non-smelly. I think it works pretty well. They also got their first bit of grit. They have dirt and mulch to pick at in their yard, so I think they've been getting sufficient grit, but I added the real stuff (bits of granite) just to make sure they were getting it.





The girls are still on chick crumbles. I have been patiently waiting for eggs/their food to run out so I can switch them over to layer feed. We also have oyster shells on standby. We've been telling people for a while now that eggs are supposed to be coming, so it’s been a long wait. They are 18.5 weeks old now, making them right around the age at which they lay eggs. Of course I will let you all know when it happens!







These girls sure are purdy. The photos don't show it well, but they are shiny beauties with silken feathers. I can't say enough good things about having the chickens. They are so much fun to have around the garden. If only we could keep their names straight!