Friday Afternoon

The chicks are just brown balls of feathers.  They still stand by the door whenever I come.  Here they are enjoying lunch.  Off to the right facing forward is Mr. Rooster.

 

 We have cats at our place and 4 are kittens.

 

I visited the kittens and while walking back 3 cats were following me.  Around the corner came our dog, Otto who chased the cats.  In the end, 2 cats were in the tree and 1 by the pine trees.

 

 

I have a Rooster!

I discovered that I have a rooster!  It's the only one that has a red comb and a wobble.  Roosters get their combs and wobbles earlier then hens do.  Thankfully, there is only one.

 

  Our robin Fluff has stopped wobbling and is now hopping around.  He was relaxing on the hammock.

 

 But then the chair seemed to be more comfortable.

Czech Days

It's Czech Days again in Tabor.  Yesterday was the Czech Days Parade. Usually, our family would sit with our umbrellas opened and watch the parade.  But this year we were in the parade! We even had our own entry!  Dad has a WC-52 . My job was handing out little flags.

 

  We also got a pictures with the 1990 and 1967 Czech Queens.

 

 

And of course, we had to buy some kolaches. But my favorite, cream cheese, was sold out!  Dad got lemon, Bea got pineapple, and I got rhubarb.

Dreaming of the Outdoors

It has been hot these past couple of days, so I opened some windows in the door. The chicks are in the background looking through the other door. 

 

 

 Every single time I go in the coop their all sitting or sleeping by the door.  I guess they want to go outside.

 

 

Here is a view from the front,  you can barely see them.  But, they won't be going outside any time soon, until Dad gets another dog cage around the door.

 

 

Our baby robin which my sister named Mr. Fluff was playing a game of peek-a-boo. 

 

Mr. Fluff is a happy little robin getting worms and fruits every day.  He's getting a red belly and he's getting fat.  He hops and wobbles around when it is out of its can.  One interesting thing he does is he shakes his butt when he poops. It's hilarious! 

 

 

 

Clean Coop

Yesterday was cleaning day for the chickens.  I grabbed a pitchfork and started tossing chicken poop in the back of an ATV.  Then I got a small square bale, and Dad cut the wire off.  The chickens were happy and scratching in their clean coop.

The chickens below are doing their own version of "ring 'round the rosy".

 

 This chicken is doing a fancy leg pose.

 

 While cleaning the coop my dog, Otto, was taking a rest.

 

Oyster Shell Self Feeder

Oyster shells are really important for eggs.  Oyster shells make the egg shells hard. The big hens got an oyster shell self feeder.  It was originally supposed to be a pig feeder, but it can be used for oyster shells too.  The oyster shells used to go in that bucket underneath, but now it catches fallen pieces of shell.

 

I thought it was funny that the feeder was made by Nelson Products. 

 

 

 

When I was taking these pictures the chickens were ready to go to sleep.

 

Baby Robin

Yesterday we found 3 baby birds on the lawn.  They fell out of their nest from the wind storm in the morning.  Two were dead and one was alive.  We put the living robin in a coffee can with some pine shavings on the bottom.  My brother, sister, and I have been digging for worms.  I have done some research on how to raise the robin.

 

I noticed that a chick has a little wobble and a comb.  This chick was the only one who had the wobble.  This is the best picture of the wobble, the chick wouldn't hold still!

 

For the past few weeks my sister Bea has been doing a project, making our family out of plastic beads.  She completed it yesterday.  Fred, Bea, and I are on the top and mom and dad are on the bottom.

 

 

And yes, my mom's hair is really gray and dark brown, and she's in her early forties.

Too Cozy for Comfort

Yesterday I increased the space for the chicks.  I removed the cardboard and I changed the heat lamp bulb.  I do need some more pine shavings to put on the floor. 

This is before I did it.  Their coop was made in the corner of the building.

Here is there new space.  They get the whole 3/4 of the building.

 

Yesterday I made my Dad put in a new lamp bulb.  Previously, I used a red bulb which produced a lot of heat. So for the last few summer nights it was 100 degrees in the chick coop.  With this new bulb there is more light and less heat so I can leave it on at night.  I won't worry about having "hot" chicks.  With more light I realized the chicks are quieter and don't chirp so loudly.

What's On the Other Side?

I went into the chick coop today and all the chicks were peeping when usually they're quiet and sleeping. I knew something was going on.  There was a big flying contest taking place!  I guess their waterer is not high enough anymore.  They had their sites on the higher cardboard wall.

 

Every chick was looking at the top of the wall and peeping like crazy.  Chicks were flying and crashing into the wall. Some chicks jumped on top of the waterer and then tried to fly up top.   But only few made it to the top.

 

 

The chick wanted to see what existed on the other side.

 

But there wasn't much to see except the floor.  So it just hopped back into the little coop.

Goodies!!!!

This afternoon I made some oatmeal raison cookies.  There wasn't has much as I expected there to be, but I have reasons why, Mom and me eating the cookie dough and Dad eating some cookies.  Well here's what I ended up with.

Also the chickens got some goodies too, some muskmelon peelings.

The chicks didn't get any goodies today, but I think they'll survive without some.  They were all staring at the camera today,  I don't know what had got into them.

One wanted to get a better view from the top of their waterer.

Morning Dove?

Sometime last week Mom and Bea were pulling weeds.  Dad was outside working in the shed.  I was just dinking around outside.  Well, I was inside getting a drink and I looked out the window. I see my Mom with a rake on top of something.  I ran outside and Dad was holding this bird.  It was gray with a long beak.  Mom thinks it's a morning dove.  We ended up taking the bird into a patch of trees.

 

Naughty Chickens

The chicks are growing new wings and tails.  So the chicks have been flighty the last few days.  Yesterday I stepped in the coop and I see a chick standing right on top of their waterer.

 

Today I was sitting and watching them and 2 chicks were fighting like roosters!


With the 16 little chicks I also have 12 leghorn hens.  This morning I wanted to see how many eggs were there.  I found an egg that had a big hole.  I looked inside and it was hollow.  I'm guessing that the egg cracked while rolling into the tray and the chicken ate it.  Or the egg shell was weak and a chicken pecked the egg and ate it.

Banty Chicks!

        

Last year my Grandma got 4 banties like the ones above. Grandma named the 2 roosters Benny and Bobby, and she called the 2 hens Henny and Penny.  Today the roosters fight each other, fly at people's faces, and bite!  The hens are sweet and make funny clucking noises.  Well, last weak Grandma discovered that a hen had a nest of 10 eggs.  So, Grandma built a small coop made of wire in a corner in her chicken coop.  There are 9 chicks (see photo below).  I dont know how all of them can fit under the hen!
 

 

So, maybe I'll see banties in my future!  But, I will NOT get any banty roosters!

Wasting the Feed

The chicks are wasting their feed!  Those stinkers are scratching their food out. So here's what I did.  I set their feeder on top of their carboard feeder, so if they did scratch it out it would go into their other feeder to be eaten. 

 

 

 

It's an inch tall from the ground to the food.  So it takes some figuring out to do.

Some ate normal, but some were standing in the feeder.  The chick above was doing a balancing act trying to stand in the feeder.

 

These two chicks seem to be hugging the chick to the left.

Today is a breezy day, so it's not a cook stove in the chick's coop.  I still think those little buggers are going to scrap the feed out.  You never know what those little legs can do!

Chick Feeder News

The new feeder is going well.  The chicks are eating the proper way from their feeder.  

 

 Fourteen were gobbling up their food. But the other two had something better to do.....

taking a nap!!!

It was almost 100 degrees in the chick coop.  So I turned off their heat lamp, and it started to cool down.

New Feeder for a New Month

 Today, the chicks got a new feeder.  The chicks are definitely not shy when it comes to new things.  They were fun to watch. 

 For now it looks like the chicks are using the old cardboard feeder as a bed.