Carol's Chickens

Dotty is our last girl to start laying eggs. She is a month younger than the other girls and they started laying at eight months while Dotty started laying at nine months. She has now laid thirteen eggs in the last seventeen days, including one with a double yolk. Pepper who is the same breed (dominique) has been laying for seventy three days but despite this Dotty’s eggs are already larger than Pepper’s.

Dotty’s larger egg on the right and Pepper’s on the left

These eggs were laid yesterday. Dotty has laid bigger eggs right from the start. Maybe her slower maturing has something to do with this or maybe it is just because she is different. I find this quite interesting. I thought when I first got these girls, that being the same breed I may not be able to tell them apart but in reality they are quite different and both me and my husband have no trouble telling them apart.

They look different, sound different and have different personalities. Pepper is top hen and is a gentle leader. She is lower to the ground, wider, has a paler face with smaller wattles and a gentle expression that matches her gentle personality. She likes to jump on my back or my lap and is a quiet girl.

Dotty is taller and more upright, she has a brighter red comb and wattles with longer wattles, her comb and wattles almost complete a circle shape around her face. She has a black mark on her beak and a naughty expression to match her cheeky personality. She likes to jump on to my shoulder and liked to steel my earrings until I was forced to remove them. She rarely goes “boc boc” like the other girls but has her own happy song which she sings in my ear from my shoulder or sings while eating treats. It’s difficult to describe but is something like a tuneful “dah dah dah-DAH”, with the last “DAH” being a higher tone and the phrase being repeated a couple of times.

At the moment I can even tell their eggs apart although that may change in time. Dotty’s are larger and more pointed.

Bluebell is a different breed (chalkhill blue) and lays blue eggs about the same size as Pepper’s and quite round in shape. Bluebell has been laying for seventy nine days and lays almost every day. She is the most nosey and the brightest but is bottom hen as she has never ever pecked at another hen. She prefers to perch on my arm or sometimes jump from my arm to my shoulder. Bluebell is the loudest girl and if she wants to get in the nest box when another girl is in there she shouts about it. She also shouts to let everyone know she is about to lay an egg She goes “boc boc BOC”, repeated several times with the last “BOC” louder and longer.

Yesterday my husband decided to dig over our vegetable plot and therefore needed to find a new home for the trays of grass that I was overwintering on the veg plot. He rummaged through the shed and found some planks of wood and some brackets (it comes in handy that he never throws anything away!). He fixed the shelves to the outside of the chicken enclosure, sloping them downwards slightly to allow for water to run off.

Shelves for the trays of grass

The grass trays on the shelves from another angle

They are just to the side of the gate so will be easy for me to take in to the chickens and my husband thinks they will get less waterlogged being up off of the ground, plus he likes everything to be tidy!

They don’t look all that healthy at the moment but if they don’t make a comeback by the beginning of summer, I will buy another turf and redo them. Even if I bought a new turf every year it would still be worth it as the price of one square of turf is not much and last summer it gave the girls some grass every day. I would give them one tray a day and by the time they had eaten the grass in the last tray, the first tray had regrown ready to go back in to the girls.

Yesterday and today, between me and my husband, we dug over the veg plot and dug in our chicken compost. As we dug up worms we tossed them into the chickens. The girls were lined up behind the weld mesh that separates them from the veg plot and were in a state of excitement waiting for the worms. They had quite a feast and got a bit of exercise running after worms and running after each trying to steal them. It was a fun afternoon for us and the girls.

That’s it! I am now giving up wearing earrings for the time being. I have two piercings on each ear and was wearing a small gold stud with a tiny diamond earring below it in each ear.

I switched the gold stud for a tiny ruby but last night Dotty jumped on my shoulder and took a peck at the ruby. I managed to save it and decided to take the top pair out as she hadn’t yet ever gone for the bottom pair.

Tonight she jumped to my shoulder and as fast as lightening took my diamond stud. Again, I briefly felt the tiny earring back but then it was lost. I searched with a torch but couldn’t find anything and think Dotty must have swallowed the diamond too. She has now swallowed two gold studs and a tiny diamond stud and I am left with one odd gold stud and one odd diamond stud.

I have now removed my earrings and decided to leave them out for a while. Only Dotty has done this and it’s been my right ear each time. That’s an expensive collection of grit she has in her crop! It’s a good job I love these girls.

Today I wanted to take some close ups of the girls and capture their faces. This is incredibly difficult as they always move just as I click and unlike other pets won’t look up when you call their name. Many of the best ones were blurred as they moved when I clicked, chickens are not still for more than seconds!

Bluebell is the easiest to photograph and Pepper is incredibly difficult, it’s almost as if she is camera shy. She won’t look to camera and always dips her head or turns away as I click. I did my best!

Bluebell

Bluebell

I managed to capture Bluebell from each side of her floppy comb.

Dotty

Dotty

This shows the black mark on Dotty’s beak, she also has longer wattles than Pepper.

Pepper

Pepper

It was such a shame that Bluebell turned her head away just as I clicked but I have included it because it is a rare one of Pepper’s face.

I think there is so much character in these faces.

A couple of weeks ago Dotty ate one of my earrings. It was a gold stud and when I looked in my jewellery box I found that I had a spare identical earring. I must have lost one many years ago and bought an identical pair which gave me the spare, so the simple thing seemed to put that one in my ear in place of the “lost” one.

Last night at bedtime I was having a bit of together time with the girls. I was sat with my arm resting on the coop handle and Bluebell jumped onto my arm, she prefers to have a perch. Dotty as usual jumped onto my shoulder and Pepper jumped onto my lap. I think this is the first time I have had all three girls sat on me at once.

Suddenly Dotty once again swiftly removed my earring from the same ear as before. It was a bit difficult for me to do much about it with three chickens sat on me. Again I reached up and found the earring missing but the back still there. With three chickens sat on me and the earring back being super tiny, I lost it. I thought I had managed to push it into my pocket but couldn’t find it later.

I couldn’t find the earring so can only think that once again Dotty has swallowed it. She now has a matching pair!

I have now replaced the gold studs with some tiny ruby studs. I hope these will be less shiny and therefore less attractive to Dotty. I don’t know what else to do as it would be difficult to keep taking them out every time I go into the girls as I am in and out all day. I feel like I need to wear ear defenders but that’s not practical either and as anyone who wears earrings will know, if you leave them out the pierced hole will close up.

I hope this pair will stop Dotty taking them. She is so quick and accurate that I feel nothing but a quick tug and can’t tell the earring has gone until I put my hand up to check. I am amazed that she pulls it from the back without making contact to my skin and therefore not hurting me.

I hope the earring don’t harm her, she doesn’t seem to be effected by it at all. I do hope this is the last earring she swallows!

I bought some tuna when Treacle was poorly to try to give her a boost. Over the past couple of weeks I have been gradually using it up by giving it to the girls as a treat, and it’s become their number one favourite.

On the day that I gave them the last of the tuna, I decided to photograph them. As soon as they see the white dish they get really excited and they mob me as soon as I go in through the gate. I can barely get the dish to the ground before they fall on it as if they haven’t eaten for days!

The tuna is gone in seconds, it’s a feeding frenzy! I snapped five photos in as many seconds and have included them all to show the speed that the tuna disappeared. There is tuna in the dish in the first photo and none left by the fifth.

Tuna

Going

Going

Going

Gone!

They clearly enjoyed that!

Dotty laid an enormous egg a few days ago. We saved it until today as on a Sunday we treat ourselves to a bacon and egg breakfast. I suspected it would have a double yolk so I broke it into a dish. Sure enough it did have a double yolk, our first from our girls.

Our first double yolk

When poor Treacle was ill, her comb shrunk to half it’s size and was pale and grey. Since she has gone I have noticed how bright red and healthy the other girls combs are.

Dotty has taken the longest time to mature which I think was because she was born a month later in the year than the others. Now she has matured she has the brightest red comb and although she only started laying eggs nine days ago, she now lays the biggest eggs. Maybe this slower maturing has been good for her.

Pepper and Dotty are both dominiques but I think they are quite different from each other. Pepper is more squat, lower to the ground, Dotty is slightly taller, narrower and more upright. Dotty has the black mark on her beak which is becoming more noticeable, a good instant way to tell them apart.

Dotty’s bright red comb and wattles

Pepper’s comb

Pepper’s comb looks dirty but actually she has little spiky grey feathers around her comb and some are just sticking over her comb.

Dotty’s beak has a little black mark on it

Pepper’s comb and wattles

Bluebell has a floppy comb

Yesterday I cut down one of the bushes in the run. It was an ancient hebe that had been dying for years and had finely given up. I was going to dig it out but my husband suggested leaving the bottom branches to provide another perch for the girls. Up until now the girls didn’t seem to notice it, but today Bluebell discovered it could be used as a perch.

Bluebell finds a new perch

Now Bluebell has discovered a new perch it should only be a matter of time before the other girls find it!

Every time I go up to the chickens they crush themselves into the smallest corner of the run because it’s the nearest corner to me as I walk towards them.

The girls rush to the corner

Here is where they first greet me

They always look as if they think they could squeeze through here to get to me quicker. They then follow me up the path and wait with excitement by the gate, especially if I am holding white pots which they know means yogurt.

They get so excited and soon have yogurt all over their beaks and are covered in flecks of it.

Pepper has yogurt on her beak

Bluebell gets her beak in the yogurt

Dotty gets her beak in the yogurt

It’s not long before the pots are empty and you would be forgiven for thinking they had been licked clean. It’s amazing how a beak can get every last little drop of yogurt.

This morning the girls were all shouting as they all wanted to lay at once. Bluebell lays every day for about a week before taking a day off. Pepper lays for a couple of days then misses a day and hadn’t laid yesterday and Dotty laid her first eggs four days in a row then missed two days, so I knew they were all ready to lay.

I went and checked the nest box a few times but no eggs. When it was time for me to go out I went to check again, still no eggs in the nest box which I thought a bit odd. Then something caught my eye on the coop floor. I took the side panel off and to my surprise there were three eggs nestled together in the middle of the coop floor. When I picked them up I got a bigger surprise. Dotty’s egg was twice the size of the other two eggs. It looked like a duck egg! How on earth did she lay something that enormous!

Dotty’s giant egg

Dotty’s egg is on the right, Pepper’s in the middle and Bluebell’s on the left. I imagine this will probably have a double yolk and will post later if it does. Dotty is certainly making up for up starting her egg laying later than the other girls. No wonder she missed a couple of days. Dotty is full of surprises!

Since we lost Treacle, Pepper has taken her place as top hen. She is a good top hen as she is a mild character and doesn’t peck much. Pepper gets the biggest worms when I fork over the garden area and is always last to bed. As she has grown in confidence she has given Bluebell a quick peck when she gets in her way, to show her she is now top.

Bluebell goes to look in the coop many times a day, which she never did before we lost Treacle. I am sure she is still looking for her. The girls stick closer to me at the moment but they look healthy and there is harmony in the flock. When I give treats, I now put down one dish instead of two and there has been no squabbling.

I did consider whether to get another hen or perhaps a couple of bantams but realise it would be selfish as it would be for me not for the flock. It could upset the flock as it’s not always easy to add new members and as they are calm and happy now, I decided the best thing is to stay as we are. If we ever got down to two girls then I think I would add another two, but now think we should take time to enjoy these three girls after our recent upset.

I have thought over past events many times and know that I must stop dwelling on it as we will never know why Treacle became ill.

Dotty has laid four days in a row before taking a day off  which is really good as a new layer. Yesterday she had been going in and out of the nest box in the late afternoon. When I went in to do my evening sweep up I opened the nest box to see if she had laid yet. There was no egg but Dotty jumped into the nest box from outside of the coop and settled down so I gently closed the lid. I resumed my sweeping up and a few moments later she emerged from the coop. I looked in the nest box again and sure enough there was her egg, all toasty warm. She had a quick feed and drink before going in to bed.

I still really miss Treacle, it is strange not seeing her rush to greet me and I miss her big brown splash of colour when I go up to the girls. I have to remember to give a quarter less when I dish out the treats and in the morning my clean up is noticeably quicker with a quarter less poop to pick up, but there is harmony in the flock at the moment and I am determined to enjoy these girls and do the very best for them that I can.