Carol's Chickens

At this time of year the sun is patchy in the chicken run. The girls will always find a patch of sun though.

Sitting in a patch of sun

First they were on one side of the run and then a little later on the other side of the run.

Snoozing in another patch of sun

They are experts at following the sun around.

It’s that time of year again! I worm the girls twice a year, in March and in September. I use flubenvet powder and one box does the year. I find the easiest way for me, is to make up four little dishes of mash. I then sprinkle on a level measuring spoon of powder over the four dishes. The measuring spoon is included in the box of powder. I mix it in and set the four dishes down on the chicken’s patio.

Worming the girls

They all get a share

If the bottom girl isn’t getting any I will put her on top of the nest box with her own dish and guard her until she gets a share. At the moment Cinnamon and Apricot are the bottom girls but they were easily getting their share so this wasn’t needed. It’s testament to how well the flock are getting on together that I am not needing to help any of the girls to get a share.

I put only a small amount of mash in each dish so that it is all consumed quickly and I know that that they have all had some powder. My girls are so small that only a small amount of powder is easily enough.

In the past I have done this with fish but for the last few years Emerald hasn’t been interested in fish so I changed to mash which is equally liked by all the girls. I have also used sunflower hearts in a little olive oil and then powder added and chopped grapes with powder added. Over time though I have found that the mash works best as it’s not messy and is quickly and equally consumed.

The flubenvet has to be given for seven consecutive days so this will be our morning routine for a week. If the girls have any worms they will show up in the poop on the second day. Hopefully there will be none and this is just a preventative measure. I think the girls will enjoy having mash for a week.

The  box of living leaves which I bought for the girls at the bargain price of sixty pence had regrown about as much I thought they were going to. It was time to give them to the girls for a second go.

Emerald is first to the box of greens

Rusty and Freckles join her

Apricot joins them

The leaves are disappearing

Soon there are just stalks left

I think we have definitely had our money’s worth out of these. They were actually quite tough so when the girls were finished with them I added them to the compost bin.

It was funny how once again Emerald and Speckles went straight to them but the little girls were wary at first. Rusty and Speckles are always the boldest of the little girls and then Apricot. Dandelion and Cinnamon didn’t show much interest.

Speckles was still playing her role of mother hen and was plucking little bits from the leaves and dropping them in front of the little girls. I think we have done justice to this box of leaves.

When it has been raining and there are a few wet patches in the run I dig for worms for the girls. As soon as the girls see the fork they follow me with great excitement. I have to be super careful with the fork as they have no fear of it.

Cinnamon gets the lion’s share of the worms because she is so quick. If I dig for potatoes in the veg plot I also give the girls any worms I find. Rusty gave Cinnamon a real pecking to her back after she manged to get most of the worms the other day. I could feel Rusty’s anger but even when I directed a worm towards her Cinnamon would nip in and snatch it and run with it.

While digging in the run today it was Cinnamon and Dandelion who got most of the worms. Cinnamon would go racing round the run with a worm while Dandelion chased her and tried to get it off of her. I wanted to take some photos but they were just way too speedy.

At one point Cinnamon and Dandelion had a tug of war with a worm and they managed to get half each.

Dandelion and Cinnamon have half a worm each

Dandelion’s half of the worm is on the ground just beneath her beak. In the background Cinnamon is pecking at her half of the worm.

Cinnamon gets the next worm

By the time I caught her up to take a photo the worm had nearly all disappeared.

Cinnamon got most of the worms as usual and this time Dandelion had a real go at her. These two used to be best friends and while integrating them, Dandelion used to cry, if she lost sight of Cinnamon. You wouldn’t imagine it now if you could see how brutal her attack was on Cinnamon when she got the last worm. She pulled at her feathers and pulled Cinnamon over. Cinnamon was left shaking her head afterwards.

I wondered if maybe digging for worms wasn’t such a good idea if it was going to cause such anger. In contrast, when they couldn’t pull a big worm from the ground, Speckles pulled it out and offered it to the little girls. The contrast of behaviour between former friends and surrogate mother was startling.

I always used to think that digging for worms was such fun but I am learning how aggressive seramas can be to each other in the heat of the moment. Who would have thought such cute little girls could behave like this!

I love to see Speckles with one of the little girls snuggling up to her.

Dandelion snuggles up to Speckles while Rusty pecks besides them

Dandelion often has her head in her ruffles.

Togetherness

I find it very sweet to see each of the little girls at different times sitting next to Speckles, the surrogate, mother hen.

I felt that our wooden shelter could do with another perch a bit further inside it as the existing perch is on it’s front edge and it has a platform at the back. I wanted to get the girls used to another perch before winter in the hope that this would mean they would use it in winter.

The wooden shelter before getting an extra perch

Speckles likes to stand on top of the shelter.

The shelter has a new perch

Apricot demonstrates the new perch. She is the easiest of the girls to pick up so I use her for trying out new perches. I hope that the girls will soon discover this perch for themselves making it more likely that they will perch there on cold, windy days.

Our runner beans are really late this year. We had only picked enough for one meal before this weekend. The last few days have been lovely and sunny and suddenly the beans have really got going.

The beans were hanging in bunches

A couple of days of pickings

The beans are prepared

The beans are cooked

I have divided the beans into three meals

We will have one portion for Sunday dinner and two portions will go into the freezer. I have tried various recommended ways of freezing runner beans. Blanching them seems to be the most popular but I never liked them after that. By trial and error I have found the way that suits me best.

I treat them the same as frozen peas. I cook the beans to just how I like to eat them. I like them soft and tender. I then cool them under cold water and divide them into portions. I then freeze them and when we want to eat them I put them in a saucepan straight from the freezer and bring them to the boil. Drain and serve just like frozen peas. To me they taste just the same as if they have just been cooked when done in this way.

I am freezing the extra two portions because there will be more to pick over the coming week and we will eat those while fresh. The good thing about runner beans is that once they get going they usually keep going until the first frost.

The courgettes and tomatoes are still abundant too and the salad leaves I recently planted are growing nicely. We are also eating the fir apple potatoes. I am digging them up one plant at a time. I recently made some potato salad from them which suits their texture really well.

This year has been as good for garden veg as last year was bad, laughable in fact! You never quite know how it’s going to go but it’s fun finding out.

I love the sedums at this time of year. They add a bit of late colour to the garden and they attract the bees. There are bees all over them. They are mostly honey bees and what we call “teddy bear bees”. We don’t know what these bees are called but they appear to be furry which is why we call them teddy bears.

Honey bees on the sedum

Teddy bear bee

Both type of bee

Sedum with honey bees

Sedum with both sort of bees

I love both the splash of colour and the bee activity and the sedums also go on looking good right through autumn.

Occasionally I give the girls some fish as a treat. I give any fish that is in olive oil. A small tin is low cost and gives the girls about a teaspoon of fish each. It adds a bit of protein which is benificial when they are moulting.

Speckles seems to have been moulting forever and I am still picking up loads of her feathers and Rusty is moulting too.

Dandelion, Cinnamon and Apricot are laying again as well as Freckles who hasn’t taken a break for ages. Dandelion’s egg had a good shell. I think the stress of Rusty’s prolapse triggered her to moult more than usual but if that keeps her from laying then I happy about that. The longer break she takes from laying the better.

I put the fish into four little dishes.

Some fish for the girls

Apricot is missing as she is in the nest box

Speckles is being mother hen to Dandelion, she was doing the same to Cinnamon a little earlier

Apricot has just laid her egg

Cinnamon and Apricot have the fish to themselves

The three amigos sharing the fish

By the end of the day the dishes were empty and I knew that all the girls had had a share.

Speckles continues to behave like a mother hen to a brood of chicks. She calls the little girls to any treat and picks up bits of the treat and drops it in front of them. I have only ever seen this behaviour on videos of mother hens with chicks.

I have never come across anyone else who has reported this behaviour with an unrelated hen and adult girls, albeit, little girls. She is often sat in the run surrounded by her little girls. It is the most peculiar but endearing behaviour and we have often speculated how long this behaviour will continue. She has been behaving like this for four months now, since her and Emerald became the only two bigger girls in the flock.

Freckles and Rusty are firm friends but when it comes to the treats Rusty will peck Freckles out of her way. It isn’t in a chicken’s nature to be unselfish and when it comes to treats it’s every girl for herself so it is very odd to see Speckles giving treats to the little girls and often foregoing them herself.

When I dig for worms the best of friends run around the run trying to take possession of the worm but if Speckles gets one she places it in front of the nearest little girl. I would be interested to know if anyone has come across this before. I will update when this behaviour changes because even real chicks have to grow up and their mums eventually stop mothering them. I suspect it would change when Speckles comes back into lay but that isn’t usually until the end of February which is a long time for a hen to act as a mother.

I don’t have the technical knowledge to put on a video or sound but I did let my mum listen to Speckles over the phone recently when I gave out the bedtime treat. She makes so much noise as she excitedly calls the girls that my mum asked how she managed to get any herself and I replied that she often doesn’t.

We are quite sure that in Speckles we have the nuttiest of chickens.

As Dandelion has been laying thin shelled eggs I thought I would feed the girl’s egg shells back to them to boost their calcium. They have grit and crushed oyster shell in a hopper that they can help themselves to at any time but this will give them a bit of extra calcium.

I put the broken egg shells on parchment paper in a tray and then in to the oven on low for about half an hour. It is really just to dry the egg shells out so that they will crush easily.

Eggs shells straight from the oven

I then crush the egg shells with a pestle and mortar and then mix them into a dish of mash. I know that the girls love a dish of mash and it means that they are getting a healthy treat as it’s their normal pellets mixed with water and then the egg shells added.

Egg shells ground up

Egg shells mixed with mash

Five little girls round the dish

I love the way the bigger girls seem to take on a parental role and allow the little girls to have their share rather than any chasing away.

They enjoy a treat that is good for them

They love this and they all got a share of it. By the end of the day the dish was empty. This means they have all had their extra helping of calcium. Even if it doesn’t help, it won’t do any harm so there is nothing to lose by giving them this and I know that they have enjoyed it.