What no one told me was that it was going to be so addictive. I opted for blacks sexlink chickens because I knew I didn't want any roosters and got the black stars that were available at my feed store that day. I had no clue that once I got home and started watching what my family affectionately calls chicken t.v. that I was going to want more.
First of all let me describe chicken t.v. to you. We call it this because we all would find ourselves rushing home from work each day only to head out to let our girls free for a few hours of chicken fun of scratching and pecking the grass and dirt. While we all sit watching every move they make.
I am pretty sure my brother in law thought we were crazy when he would pull up on the four wheeler to speak to my husband to find us all sitting on chairs watching the chickens. They are simply fascinating and can provide hours of enjoyment. It's really like therapy.
My daughter and I were determined that they would be trained and we would put corn in a jar and shake it and make a clicking noise to call them to us. I must say it worked like a charm because a year later anytime they see me carrying something in my hands they come stampeding on their little chicken feet looking almost heart stopping a little like what a raptor dinosaur must have looked like running for his meal.
For a few weeks we were total idiots over the chickens, and then we spent an hour chasing them trying to catch them to put them back up. It was difficult and I often felt like I was going to die of heart failure trying to catch them. My daughter proved to be a patient chicken wrangler and could get them better than I. We soon learned however that once it got to be dusk they would want to naturally roost, so it was easier to catch them, because they were either trying to roost on us, or on low lying branches. Once their official home was built I just let them put themselves away. They are so good about it.
The Creole Chick
Tuesday, June 21, 2016
It's all about the chickens....
First and foremost, I must say it's all about the chickens, really! I AM that crazy chicken lady you have been warned about.
I grew up with family members having small farms and all of them raised chickens. My grandmother raised laying hens to sell eggs and she often sent me out to the chicken coop to gather eggs for breakfast or a customer, knowing I was always willing and happy to have an excuse to visit the chickens. I remember one stubborn hen who must have been broody because every time I stuck my hand in to get an egg she pecked me so hard I would bleed and Grandma would have to get out the Dr. Titchner's to put on my hand.
Later years after my grandmother moved and we had sold her house, my husband and I lived in what used to be the field next door to the old place and the new inhabitants would often go sit in the old chicken coop to smoke, I laughed and told them that they were sitting in the chicken coop and they said, well that explains the smell in here.
My elderly cousins Bert and Leona who had raised my grandfather had a larger chicken coop, it was fenced in and the roosters walked about protecting their hens. As a child when we went to visit and all the hugging and kissing formalities were dispensed with I headed straight out to the back porch, and grabbed a few ears of dried corn from the wooden crate by the back door and passed the old fashioned pump, but never without giving it a few pumps. Stopping cautiously at the gate to locate the roosters before I opened it. Corn ready in case one of them decided he wanted me gone. I knew I could usually satisfy his ire with an few kernels of corn. As soon as I entered the gate I was surrounded by dozens of adoring clucking for corn hens. There was nothing like being adored by those hens as though I was a super star. Once the corn was gone I put the empty cob into a pail hanging on a nail at the gate. Nothing went to waste as these went to a neighboring farms pigs. After leaving the chickens behind generally because the rooster decided to run at me. I would have to go by the pump and actually use the water spicket next to it that was jutting from the ground to wash my hands. There was generally a hunk of lye soap there also. The water was always ice cold.
In my teen years when the chickens were long gone my cousins and I turned the coop into our own personal fort hanging Scott Baio posters inside and sitting on carpet squares, we painted our toenails and gossiped.
As an adult I had many cats and a few dogs as pets. My husband's family had a farm where I could go out and look at the biddies after they had hatched, and the longing in my heart never ceased. I wanted my own chicken. After all didn't my father have a pet chicken that went everywhere with him when he was a boy sitting on his shoulder? I wanted that, but could never convince my husband that chickens were something we truly lacked in our lives.
Then one day the children were just adults, poof like that. I pestered and pleaded, especially when I passed by a house right on our country highway where the chickens often wandered right next to the road. See, I pleaded their chickens haven't been eaten by hawks or attracted coyotes. They've been there at least three years now. So, last year on my birthday I again made the plea, This is all I want for my birthday, some chickens. Big eyes and guilt trip finally won out, next thing I knew I was in the truck headed to the Feed Store down the road. Four little Black Star Pullets in a box without a place to stay when I got them back home. I would worry about that later. For now I had my dream, fuzzy little baby chicks. I realized my grown children had never even held one which was obvious when my daughter squealed and screamed as it wiggled in her hand. She soon began to get the hang of it though. Since we had four little ladies we decided to name them after the grandmother's in thw family. Irma (called Sis) Cookie, Cecelia (called CeCe) and Nettie.My daughter volunteered her old wire rabbit hutch for the time being and it was a perfect place for a brooder.
It wasn't long before the perfection wore off and I was getting a phone call from my daughter while my husband was having eye surgery. She was screeching hysterically into the phone that something was wrong with CeCe, the other chicks were pecking at her chest and it was bleeding. I calmed her down and convinced her that she could touch her, and she should move her away from the others for now. She did so, and by the time I got home she was convinced CeCe was going to die. I got out the purple wound kote and a q-tip and applied some to her wound. It really wasn't that bad and by the next week she was back with the other girls.
Every month my husband would ask eggs yet? When are they going to lay eggs? My mother in law a country girl born and bred had to be told that we could not hatch any chicks from these eggs as we didn't have a rooster. She kind of looked at me blankly. To which, yes I did have to go on to explain that without a rooster the eggs were not fertilized. Which meant no chicks.
To top it all off when they finally did start laying my daughter refused to eat any egg and still a year later insists she watch me crack a store bought egg for her breakfast to make sure I am not fooling her. She doesn't know what she is missing. I'll take a fresh brown egg over a bleached store bought white egg from poor hens that are kept caged and cramped in small spaces their whole lives.
The Creole Chick
I grew up with family members having small farms and all of them raised chickens. My grandmother raised laying hens to sell eggs and she often sent me out to the chicken coop to gather eggs for breakfast or a customer, knowing I was always willing and happy to have an excuse to visit the chickens. I remember one stubborn hen who must have been broody because every time I stuck my hand in to get an egg she pecked me so hard I would bleed and Grandma would have to get out the Dr. Titchner's to put on my hand.
Later years after my grandmother moved and we had sold her house, my husband and I lived in what used to be the field next door to the old place and the new inhabitants would often go sit in the old chicken coop to smoke, I laughed and told them that they were sitting in the chicken coop and they said, well that explains the smell in here.
My elderly cousins Bert and Leona who had raised my grandfather had a larger chicken coop, it was fenced in and the roosters walked about protecting their hens. As a child when we went to visit and all the hugging and kissing formalities were dispensed with I headed straight out to the back porch, and grabbed a few ears of dried corn from the wooden crate by the back door and passed the old fashioned pump, but never without giving it a few pumps. Stopping cautiously at the gate to locate the roosters before I opened it. Corn ready in case one of them decided he wanted me gone. I knew I could usually satisfy his ire with an few kernels of corn. As soon as I entered the gate I was surrounded by dozens of adoring clucking for corn hens. There was nothing like being adored by those hens as though I was a super star. Once the corn was gone I put the empty cob into a pail hanging on a nail at the gate. Nothing went to waste as these went to a neighboring farms pigs. After leaving the chickens behind generally because the rooster decided to run at me. I would have to go by the pump and actually use the water spicket next to it that was jutting from the ground to wash my hands. There was generally a hunk of lye soap there also. The water was always ice cold.
In my teen years when the chickens were long gone my cousins and I turned the coop into our own personal fort hanging Scott Baio posters inside and sitting on carpet squares, we painted our toenails and gossiped.
As an adult I had many cats and a few dogs as pets. My husband's family had a farm where I could go out and look at the biddies after they had hatched, and the longing in my heart never ceased. I wanted my own chicken. After all didn't my father have a pet chicken that went everywhere with him when he was a boy sitting on his shoulder? I wanted that, but could never convince my husband that chickens were something we truly lacked in our lives.
Then one day the children were just adults, poof like that. I pestered and pleaded, especially when I passed by a house right on our country highway where the chickens often wandered right next to the road. See, I pleaded their chickens haven't been eaten by hawks or attracted coyotes. They've been there at least three years now. So, last year on my birthday I again made the plea, This is all I want for my birthday, some chickens. Big eyes and guilt trip finally won out, next thing I knew I was in the truck headed to the Feed Store down the road. Four little Black Star Pullets in a box without a place to stay when I got them back home. I would worry about that later. For now I had my dream, fuzzy little baby chicks. I realized my grown children had never even held one which was obvious when my daughter squealed and screamed as it wiggled in her hand. She soon began to get the hang of it though. Since we had four little ladies we decided to name them after the grandmother's in thw family. Irma (called Sis) Cookie, Cecelia (called CeCe) and Nettie.My daughter volunteered her old wire rabbit hutch for the time being and it was a perfect place for a brooder.
It wasn't long before the perfection wore off and I was getting a phone call from my daughter while my husband was having eye surgery. She was screeching hysterically into the phone that something was wrong with CeCe, the other chicks were pecking at her chest and it was bleeding. I calmed her down and convinced her that she could touch her, and she should move her away from the others for now. She did so, and by the time I got home she was convinced CeCe was going to die. I got out the purple wound kote and a q-tip and applied some to her wound. It really wasn't that bad and by the next week she was back with the other girls.
Every month my husband would ask eggs yet? When are they going to lay eggs? My mother in law a country girl born and bred had to be told that we could not hatch any chicks from these eggs as we didn't have a rooster. She kind of looked at me blankly. To which, yes I did have to go on to explain that without a rooster the eggs were not fertilized. Which meant no chicks.
To top it all off when they finally did start laying my daughter refused to eat any egg and still a year later insists she watch me crack a store bought egg for her breakfast to make sure I am not fooling her. She doesn't know what she is missing. I'll take a fresh brown egg over a bleached store bought white egg from poor hens that are kept caged and cramped in small spaces their whole lives.
The Creole Chick
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