In Honor of a New Season of Dr. Who

In honor of a new season of Doctor Who on BBC America, I decided to show you the companions of The Doctor after which our hens have been named.  (See "Meet Our Girls" to compare names with birds and breeds.)

Rosie, our second Cherry Egger, named afterRose Tyler. Our first, Rose, was a Buff Orpington,a blond.

Donna, our Australorp, named after Donna Noble

Martha, our Bard Rock, is named after Martha Jones

Amelia, our first Cherry Egger, is name after the red-headed, Amelia Pond (a true ginger)

Rory, the name change of our Buff Orpington pullet
when we discovered 'she' was a 'he,' named after Rory Williams.

Clara, our recent rescue, a Cinnamon Queen, is named after the
most recent Doctor Who companion.

Enlarged Coop

An ever expanding adventure... we enlarged our coop today by purchasing a 6'x10' dog kennel, and installed it as an expanded run.  Patty did a fabulous job making a hole between the coop and fence, though the photos do not do it justice.  We moved the dog crate that Clara has been staying in within the kennel so that the other hens can become even more accustomed to her. 

An Update on Clara

Clara, our rescued hen, has been with us a month.  She continues to grow in strength, and lays eggs regularly. She has been moved outside, but not quite incorporated into our main coop.  Hopefully, this spring she will be healthy enough to be in our coop.

This image of Clara shows clearly her clipped upper beak ... and highlights
my belief that birds decend from dinosaurs.

The following are some pictures of Clara outside... you can see that her feathers are growing back in.

Clara Goes Out

Today, I needed to clean out the pen that Clara has been staying in, so I put her outside.  She was not relaxed out there.  Still recovering. (No more eggs from her since Friday.)

She will get there.  Looking so much better than when she came, in only three days.

Clara (wish we knew how old she was)

Our hens enjoy scratching in the garden.  Clara is in her own pen on the right.

The other girls were really not concerned about Clara's presence.

Clara's left eye now is open, but you can see bruising showing up.

The wind did not help her scruffy look.

Clara Lays an Egg!!

Well, looks like Clara may be staying!  She has been eating and drinking, recovering from her ordeal on the highway.  Sleeping a lot, eating a lot.  She is skin and bones.  Today she surprised us by laying an egg! 

Can you see the egg she laid be hind her oatmeal bow?

This pic does not have great color, but you can see Clara's egg
next to one from Donna.  Clara's egg was 2.25oz, larger than most of our others.

Why Did the Chicken Cross the Road? She Didn't! She was Rescued!!

So, this was a first... Patty is heading home, down Route 15 (2-lanes southbound)... and there in the middle of the road with traffic going 55mph around it is a CHICKEN!  Being new chicken owners and lovers, Patty does the sensible thing... she stops.  Another woman stops as well, and together they scoot the chicken off the road.  After getting a box from a local nearby restaurant, Patty volunteered to bring the bird home.

She was obviously traumatized, so Patty brought her in the house and placed the box at doorway of a large dog crate we have.  The initial hours, the hen (pretty sure she is not a rooster) was simply in shock and recovering from her recent ordeal.  We have no idea how long she had been out wandering, or where she ventured from.


She was not eating or drinking which concerned Patty.  So Patty got some water in her using a dropper and moistened some oatmeal to make a crumble.


After a little while, the little bird began eating and drinking on her own, though has not moved out of the box into the crate.  Just needing the safety and warmth, I suppose.

Patty called Lori at Stacks Chicken Farm, where we purchased our other hens.  (They have been great!)  She said that based upon the description given over the phone, this hen most likely is a Cinnamon Queen.

If she stays, her name will be Clara.

A bit of a rough state:
Her comb has a bit of darkness on the tips.
There are one or two places that are missing feathers,
where she might have been pecked by other birds or attacked by a predator.
Looks like there is a scab at her left eye.
Her top beak is cropped, clipped or broken.  The bottom part is longer.

Say "Hi," Clara!  You can see that her left eye is closed.
At first, I was wondering if she actually had an eye.
Every now and then she opens a little slit.

So, we are not sure where this all is going, but she is sleeping contentedly now.  We are pretty sure that she will NOT be staying in the house.  :)  We said we wanted an adventure!

The Diversity of Eggs

We have four hens, all brown egg layers.  As you probably have noticed they give different shapes and sizes.  Up until now, it has been challenging for me to figure out who was laying which eggs.  Today, I had the special moment of having Donna, our Australorp (the black one) lay her egg basically in my hand.  As we have noted they have been laying not in the nesting boxes of our coop but near the door.  Today when I opened the door Donna was sitting there.  She is often trying to hatch our non-fertile eggs by laying on them.  (She'd make a good momma.) I petted her a bit and she stood up revealing the three eggs under her and then.. she dropped her egg for the day, warm and beautiful!

The eggs of the day: the bottom right is the one from Donna.

 Even though she has been one of our larger birds, Donna often lays the smallest eggs.  They are lovely though.  The one in the picture at the upper left corner, I am pretty sure is from Martha.  She and Donna lay the darkest eggs.  The other two are lighter in color and are from our Reds (Cherry Eggers)... the picture does not capture their lightness (they are both the color of the bottom left).

Another Friend!

So in an earlier post, we shared a little about the other critters that hang out at our house.  Today, I'd like to introduce you to Libby, our latest addition.  She is a Boston Terrier and came to us at 11-weeks-old on January 21, 2013. 

She is a bit of a fireball, all energy... and then crashes to nap... and snore!

Can you say, "Awww..."  Adorable Factor? Over the top!!

JUMBO! -- Biggest Egg Ever!

Well we had quite the surprise when we went out for our second trip to the coop today... a Jumbo egg... 2.75oz! 
Mind you we had not even really had any large eggs.  Many of the largest eggs we had gotten to this point were 1.75oz.  Pretty sure that it was Rosie who laid this 'duck egg.'
 

Patty with the Jumbo egg!

It was so large that it barely fit into the egg carton (see back row)

Comparing it to two of our other eggs from the week.
Jumbo on right.

The jumbo egg in Cindy's hand...nearly stretches across two spaces.

What we found when we cracked open the jumbo egg... a double yolk!

How many eggs?

So, as of today, our lovely ladies have produced 125 eggs since the day after Thanksgiving 2012. They are averaging 3-4 eggs everyday.

Found this little guy at the bottomof the coop ramp.  Think it rolled down.

 

Happy New Year!

Given our "About Us" section... some day we may be able to get the blue print to build a TARDIS chicken coop like these people.  I wish there was a kit.  I can put together a kit.  Not so good with building from scratch.

Happy 2013 from the Magic Castle!!