The residents of Featherend Cottage

[Annie]

10th January
The pellets are lasting better than I expected , think now it may end up a 6 day course and not 7 but better than not at all. The silkies aren't eating their usual amount - bad babies.
Of our 16 hens, 5 are too young yet to lay, Bathsheba is too old and Melody is too posh to push - she has given us 2 or 3 eggs in the last month but being a posh girl ,obviously would prefer for the Spring to come before laying in earnest. That leaves 9 able to lay at the moment and most days I get 6 assorted eggs so don't think the girls are doing too bad for me.
One of the young legbars has started flying down the garden and getting to quite a height but shrieking at the top of her voice as she does so - not sure if its helppppppppppppppp or yippeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee !
Had to top the nest boxes and floor up today dont know if flub pellets make them poop more but the floor in particular was too grubby to ignore until the weekend.

[Annie]

January 10th
Well I could hardly believe it, after collecting all the eggs today,each one of my laying ladies have given me a gift - wow 9 eggs - well done in the winter girls xx

[Annie]

To continue my chicken keeping saga.
Can can coucou maran went broody last summer, the 1st broody I have had. I took advice from the forum but after 4 weeks thought it had gone on too long so in Can can came for a cool wash down (she needed it as she was covered in the other girls poop) and a chill out in the kitchen. Luckily it worked as when I put her out wth the rest of the flock in the evening , she straight away began scratching and pecking about with the others and never looked back.
It was a sad summer as I lost my mum in June and with arrangements to be made and one thing and another , Eck and I decided to cancel the holiday we had planned. I knew I needed a summer project though and my wee silkie babies provided me with the answer. Typical silkies, love being broody, usually at the same time, so funny to see the 3 of them head to tail squashed in the dog bed ,which is their preferred place to lay the eggs. Chrystal my original silkie was being a bit mean to Piccolo the weeny one so I decided not to use Chrystal for my project but just Piccolo and Jasmine. I was going to hatch some fertile eggs under them when next they went broody , of course I didn't have to wait long.
We had an old hen house which we put in 'our ' bit of the garden and created a run , complete with a washing up bowl dust bath. When Jassy and Piccy went broody we popped them into their maternity unit and tucked some dummy eggs under them. After a few days it was plain to see they were both hapy and content and so we went up to see Jane our poultry lady.
'Just half a dozen' I said to Eck but he saw through me -' why are you taking 2 egg boxes to the poultry supplier then' he asked. I came home with 5 cream leg bar eggs (I wanted some different coloured brown hens as apart from the ex batts mine are all grey/black/white)3 maran,3 silkie and 1 sussex.
Late in the evening we replaced the dummy eggs with the fertile ones and anxiously waited for nature to take its course.
More later

[aceface]

its purgatory having to wait for the next chapter i love haring about the babies and the chicks im usually a very patient little ace but this diary thread is driving me nuts i cant keep awy im so eager to know what everybodies stories are

[Annie]

12th Jan
Here we go , big clean out day - well in the big hen house, the silkies are clean little things and only do tiny poops so there little coop keeps pretty clean, just top up a bit more with bedding.
Popped into the horsey place yesterday and very pleased that they are stocking Farmgate (used to be spillers and I think that had yolk enhancer) got a bag of dust extacted shavings too. I was really surprised when putting in the new shavings, just how far they went, the bag seemed quite a bit smaller than my usual shavings bag but I still have well over 1/2 bag left for next week. Normally get a grain merchant to deliver the supplies to the house but had missed the delivery day so thats why I went elsewhere but I still like to use the service because the grain merchants are only Scottish stockist of flub pellets.
After the chores were done, I was having a cuppa and watching te chicken antics and I noticed thatone of the young cream leg bars has really red comb and wattles, she is only 21 weeks of age so seems to be maturing quite quickly , maybe green eggs sooner than I thought

[sandy]

Cant wait to see piccies of green eggs Love reading about your girlies and you are quite right about the silkies. How can girls with so many fluffly feathers keep themselves so clean

[Annie]

By the way silkies are incredibly intelligent as well !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This morning we have a dusting of snow, just about enough to make the garden white . I went up to do the cleaning chores and went to the silkie run - I always have to let them out first or else the hooligans pile into the silkie run and act like vandals. Four little white faces peeped round the enclosure door took one look at the snow, looked to Chrystal for guidance and then turned on their diddy little legs and headed back to their home comforts . Clever girls
I took a few pics must try to post them .

[Annie]

Ok some pictures - these have been on the forum on various threads but thought I would collate them here.
Broody silkies before the BIG decision was made

Maternity unit

fertile eggs as brought home

Typically Piccolo sat on the eggs

While Jasmine dust bathed. When the chicks hatched Jassy was a very good mum

1st born - a cream leg bar, sadly a boy but he is in a good home on the Borders now

The rest of the gang at a couple of weeks of age


Out of the maternity unit and into the proper run

Just prior to mixing with big girls 12 weeks or so

Now out and about fully integrated with main flock/silkie flock
Gloria

Violet

Pinky with Melody araucana

The leg bars


although the other hens aren't in the pics they are all out together f.r.

[Annie]

Excuse me whats this all about ?
Mothers meeting ?
Strike action?
Oliver Twist impersonation - please can we have some more ?
You come into our house now can we come into yours ?
cheeky monkeys


and the one who lead them out of course is Fiddler


I will be having a word with Maisie - she is top hen but doesn't seem to be keeping the mob under control !

[aishakali]

Fantastic pics

[s33xpt]

Annie, you've got me going broody now with those pics, absolutely brilliant

[davina112]

Ooooorrrrrrr lovely pics

[julieann]

It must be great seeing them grow from birth, great pics Annie. I love your white silkies

[Annie]

14th Jan
only thing to report today is Chrystals dilemma.
I had gone up to let the silkies out, they go out 1st and the gate gets shut behind them, to keep the run tidy. She wanted out with the others but ooooooooh its eggy eggy time and she was running up and down the ramp to the hen house , undecided what to do. I shut the gate and let the big ones out of their run and poop picked in the big house. Still she was running in and out ,getting a bit stressed by now so I popped her into the big house into a nice clean nest box and there she stayed until egg duties were done , phew what a relief

[Mrs B]

Annie whenever I take the cube apart to give it a good scrub all of my flock decide they need to lay, even those who are out of lay join the queue up the ramp


Is it any wonder we are all bonkers