Finished Chicken Coop and the First Eggs!

 Back in April I talked about my in-laws getting some chicks for egg laying purposes. Well, they're all grown up now and starting to lay eggs!  The plan is for Matt's parents to have three and for us to have three.  The girls (what we call the chicks) have been together for so long though I feel kinda bad splitting them up now :(  We don't have a fence on one side of our yard yet, so until then we can't bring any chickens over anyway, but Matt did finish building our chicken coop a couple weeks ago, in the 100 degree heat no less!

 We plan to paint it white at some point, but other than that it's done.

 We plan to keep it right outside the back garage door for easy access as well as keeping is shaded during the afternoons.

 Three nesting boxes with a roosting bar in front of them, mesh wiring at the top to help with air flow.

Mesh floor for easier cleaning (theoretically) and air circulation.

When we went to a seminar at the extension office about having chickens one of the things the speaker talked about when considering coop design is that it's easy for them to turn into little ovens, so airflow is very important.

While the chickens aren't living with us yet, visiting them on Sundays after mass has become a weekly tradition. 

Melanie and Claire go outside with Gramps to let the girls out of the pen and feed them while Grams works on making breakfast.

 The chickens have gotten pretty tame and will come right up to you to eat out of your hand.

(And no, I have not fed any of the chickens out of my hand in case you were wondering.)

 They'll even let Gordon pick them up to hold and pet them. 

One of the chickens, Lady as she's been named (since she has a really nice comb and wattle that make her "pretty") started laying eggs last week, so this past Sunday the family used the eggs she had laid over the course of the week to make breakfast. 

 While we were inside starting on the cooking she laid another egg, so the girls got to go out and get it 

(She hasn't gotten in the habit of laying on the nest in the nesting boxes yet - a second one of the chickens laid her first egg after we left that day - in the chiminea!).

 Lady's eggs.

Five eggs over a six day time span.  Her newest one is on the left, the first one she laid is on the right.

As compared with an extra large store bought egg and a quarter.  The eggs will continue to get bigger for a while, the eggs she's laying now are considered pullet eggs.

The yolks were a very dark yellow, bordering on orange.  After Matt beat them the color was comparable to orange juice.  It's been very exciting to watch the chickens grow and start to lay, and our girls really enjoy the chickens as pets as well.  So while we haven't decided if we're willing to break up the chicken "family" over at my in-laws, I'm sure we'll have chickens here eventually, some way or another!

Chickens!

 If you've talked with me recently you've probably heard me say how much I like farm fresh eggs.  I just love those big yellow yokes and beautiful brown shells!  So much prettier than the standard store bought eggs.   Some might find this strange, I know.  Even more strange due to the fact that I don't eat eggs!  Bake with them, yes - all the time!  But scramble, fry or boil me an egg and you'll be barking up the wrong tree. 

Well, my fascination with fresh eggs had led me to look into the possibility of getting a few chickens.  I was reading up on it a bit and had even signed up to go to a free seminar on Urban Chickens at one of the local garden centers.  Matt had looked up some info online for me.  The site backyardchickens.com has a great bit of information for those looking into starting out with some chickens.  They even have lots of reader submitted coop designs (this one is my favorite - the guy really seemed to put a lot of thought into the design).

While I've been thinking about the whole chicken thing I've talked about it with my in-laws on Sundays while eating breakfast at their house after going to church, just as a conversation topic and to share the things we'd learned so far.  Well, we chatted about it again two Sundays ago, I even called a few stores in town that we supposed to be selling chicks to find out what breeds they had on hand since I was trying to decide what would be the best fit for us. Well what do you know, my father-in-law calls me on Monday night saying "Guess what we just bought?  Chicks!"  Six to be exact.  Talk about surprised!  I knew Gordon was interested, but I definitely wasn't expecting him to jump on the band wagon so quickly!  It shouldn't surprise me that much I suppose, he did grow up on a farm where they had truly fresh fried chicken for dinner (as in he would go kill a few chickens for his mom in the afternoon and they'd then have chicken for dinner that night)

 Tuesday evening we took the girls over to meet the fluffy little babies.

 Melanie really liked the chicks from the get go, willingly holding one as soon as we got there.

It promptly poo'd on her shoe.

Claire was a bit more stand-off-ish, but the second night we went to see them she was much more excited about them

She really wanted to hold one like Melanie had been doing

She got one!   By the head no less!
We're still working on the concept of being gentle with the chicks.  Gentle to her and gentle to them are two different things.

Also, you're not going crazy.  Between pictures we switched the chicks from a box to the tank they're in now.  These pictures were taken last week (the last couple days of March) and the chicks are already getting big for the tank.  Time to find yet another containment option!

On another note, I think I've neglected to mention this until now, but I really don't like birds.  At all.  I find them icky and creepy.  Their feet give the the heebie jeebies.  The thought of their pecky little beaks makes my skin crawl. Just not a fan of birds as a whole.

Between my dislike of eating eggs and my aversion to birds I sound like the perfect candidate for having chickens, don't I?  And this whole thing was my idea, too.

Despite all this, I am trying to overcome the bird-induced creepy crawlies.  I even picked up one of the chicks on our second visit.  It may or may not have taken me quite a while to do it, but I did in fact do it.

And then promptly washed my hands.

 *Enjoying* my first time holding a chick

"See?  I can do this!  Really I can!"
(Now can I put the chick down?  Please?)

To add another stride in my journey towards being at peace with our feathered little friends I took the girls to see the chicks again a couple days ago.  Matt stayed home with Amelia, Stacey wasn't home and Gordon was resting, so when the girls wanted to pet them I "put on my big girl pants" and picked up the chicks yet again.  I may have followed the chicks around their tank with my hand for longer than was necessary before actually picking one up, but I did do it.  Twice!
I'm making progress
(I also can't let my girls know I'm icked out by birds.  That's knowledge they could use against me later in life, and I'm not OK with that.)