My Charges

2010.09.11

My first hen and her four little chicks. What shall i call them?

The laundry cupboard that serves as her nest. They go to bed in here at 5pm sharp.

All day they scratch around in here, in the chook pen that's not yet finished. We are waiting on some hinges to fix the door. And then we will erect a roof inside. I'm sewing a lid on the top. The green is old shadecloth - to keep the snakes out.

As far as architecture goes, my chook pen leaves a lot to be desired. We made it from materials we had on site. It probably won't be the last one i build. Now that i've seen how effectively one hen and 4 little chickens dig up the ground (in search of worms), i'm inclined to build a chook tractor (moveable dome) to place over the circular beds of my mandala vegie garden for next year.

I've had my chickens only two days and they settled in immediately. A real little family they are. The chickens never stop chirping and they all never stop diggin and kicking around the stuff they find. Now i know why they put chook food in a dispenser.

I'm really impressed with this hen's mothering skills. I actually saw her pick up a whole pellet out of the big dish full i had just put down. The hen put one on the ground for a little one, right beside her. So terribly cute! Then i went on and smashed up all the pellets as the farmer had instructed me.

I'm feeding them 500g of laying pellets ( I don't think they will eat them all as i give hte same amount to my five grown up ducks) and two buckets of lettuce castoffs (from my neighbours hydroponics farm) and vegie scraps a day to kick about in. Their job is to give me lots of lovely poo to put on my garden.