my chickens

Inside "The Lodge." In the upper left corner is the nesting box. The piece of wood is a perch. Chickens feel safer on a perch even if it is only a couple feet of the ground. Most of our chickens sleep on the perch. The food and water dishes have to be refilled almost every day.

"The Lodge" as we call it from the outside. 6 of our 15 chickens sleep in here at night while the other 9 sleep in our Eglu chicken coop. 

The Eglu!!!!! the perfect backyard chicken coop for 3-5 hens.

Your probably wondering if chickens are just dirty animals all around, and although they don't bathe in water (At least they wouldn't choose to) they do keep fairly clean. They need a nice pile of dry dirt to "dust" in. They LOVE to flop around in the dirt to get bugs off (Such as chicken lice, humans can't get them thank god.)  I think it also cools them down (Have you ever rolled around in the dirt, I have and it was the best experience I ever had until my mom spotted me. Luckily the chickens ma's can't complain because they do it to.) This is a picture of our beloved chicken named Silkie. (Her breed is also a Silkie, we are so creative with our name choices, yes, every one of our 15 chickens has a name.) We have three others that look exactly like her, except she is always the most dirty. We can't seem to figure out why.

This is my mom Anne feeding the hens taco shells. (Did i mention they pretty much eat anything?) Surprisingly 14 of the 15 chickens are on this picture. One of the silkies has a very hard time seeing and it was halfway across the yard making a lot of noise. The black and white one (3rd from the right) is named Harvey. She (Yes she, but we just call her a him.) is the flock leader, or boss.

This is Silkie (shown above dusting and looking particularly messy,) gaping, not surprisingly, because of the 103 degrees temperatures! 

I bet your thinking what the heck do I do with them in the night it must be so much work to get them to go in at night, I mean its not like they go in to their house when it gets dark... hold it right there cowboy, they do!!!!!! Every night (After they have gotten used to their new home) when the sun goes down, they slowly stop what they are doing and sleepily trudge into their little house and go to bed. All you have to do is go outside and lock them in (Unless you have an over population problem, then just let the neighborhood fox get them for you) and in the morning all you gotta do is go let them out (Make sure the sun is up, we had a very traumatic experience once. Who would've guessed a fox is still out and about at five thirty in the morning, we sure didn't, and lost 5 hens because of it!) and check their food and water. By check I mean if the food dish is empty, you fill it up. Chickens are not like dogs in that way, they will only eat if their hungry (Which is always) so it is best to keep their dish refilled at all times.  If their water dish is empty (Which it should NEVER be) you sure as heck better fill it up, especially if it is hot out. Chickens like all living things that I'm aware of, can get dehydrated and die. Yes, not enough water is one of the MANY things chickens can die from. One more thing before I go. In the summer when it is hot do not call 911 if your chicken is walking around with its mouth open. (For that matter, you should never really call 911 about a chicken. I'm pretty sure even well mannered cops would laugh at you) the mouth open thing is called gaping, it is like panting for a dog. If they are gaping though, do check their water supply, please.

I will write more info on these matters in future days but if you have any immediate concerns, please feel welcome to comment on this and I will try my best to answer your questions.

Your chicken loving friend,

Iris