PICNIC

With the chickens I have a good time talking with them. I cluck and caw and they all get chatty and cluck and caw with me. The turkeys make a sort of warble which I cannot imitate, but they do have a screech or ‘raaaaaack’. I talk to them like that. Today I squatted down with them and was chatting away. They flocked around me and I became a little intimidated as they are quite large now. The biggest Toms were not talking to me, instead glaring at me sideways and moving their little forehead thing. Then this big guy and a few of his pals puff up their feathers and peck at my boots. I think I was getting involved in some male/female dynamics that I had no right to. I took note and went my way.

I bought a dozen eggs from Wes today at the PSU farmers market. You can see a few blue eggs, these are from Araucana chickens, and I wonder if the few blue eggs at the co-op are from the same breed. He has 800 chickens he tends at his uncles farm. They are all kept in 7 mobile coops, ranging in size from 5 by 7 to 8 by 16. Instead of wheels they sit on skis, and are towed around with a tractor. He doesn’t use fences, I was surprised at that. Apparently the chickens sometimes wander off and lay their eggs in the woods, sending Wes hunting for them.

The hens have been underperforming since early in the winter. 33 hens were producing about 2 eggs a day. Patrick and Holly got some more hens, I don’t know where, some very pretty golden girls. They also got these pullets and built a pullet house. (A pullet is simply a young hen.) Things are a little crazy in here, as you can see, but soon they’ll be out of the little house and into the wide world of the chicken run!