The Perfect Egg

Recently, I’ve been thinking (and blogging) about the fact that “The Girls” have yet to lay a single egg.  I’ve researched the hows and whys of egg production and have taken many suggestions to heart to encourage them to lay.

Today my routine was different.  Between the rain and the multitude of service folks in the house (locksmith fixing a broken lock, handyman painting a ceiling and the house cleaner) I didn’t get out to visit the chickens mid-morning like I usually do.  Then I ran out for an appointment and an errand so it was 5 p.m. before I went out to check on their food and water and give them their daily treat of mealworms.  I opened the door to the coop and realized the ceramic eggs I had put in their nesting boxes had all been pushed out.  But wait a minute…there’s still an egg in a nesting box…but it isn’t white like the ceramic ones…it’s brown…that’s because it’s a REAL egg!

Someone Laid An Egg! 

After months of anticipation and patience (ha!), the Perfect Egg has finally arrived! 

Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

I’ll admit it…I’m not a patient person!  I want it and I want it now…always!  The “Girls”, aka The Chickens, are now about 6 months old and they still haven’t begun to lay eggs.  It could be the lack of daylight (I put a bulb in the coop that turns on at 7 a.m. and off at 8 p.m.), the cold, or they just aren’t there yet.  I even have ceramic eggs in the nest boxes to give them an idea of what I’m waiting for!  Sometimes it can take up to 8 months for them to begin laying so all hope is not lost…yet.  My husband has begun to tell them they need to start earning their keep, however.  Organic chicken feed and gourmet seeds aren’t cheap!

Chickens are characters, I’ve discovered, and they are trainable!  Once a day I take mealworms to them as a protein treat. The girls have begun to associate my voice with these yummy treats.  As I approach the coop they start clucking up a storm and pace back and forth waiting for me to enter the coop.  Once I’m in there they dance all around my feet waiting for me to scatter the little worms for them to gobble up.  I’ve begun mixing the mealworms in with fresh greens and shaved carrots so they have to work a little harder to find them. 

It has become a daily ritual that my pit bull, Hazel, accompanies me to the coop.  She finds the girls fascinating…and she loves to eat their poop!  The Polish Chicken, Anna/Nana, storms up to Hazel (with the fencing between them) every day and fiercely pecks her on the nose when she is trying to sneak spilled scratch or other delicacies.  Hazel seems stunned by this assault, but takes it in stride. .  I’m not sure what she would do if she actually got into the pen with the girls.  She may be so focused on gobbling up the droppings that she would completely ignore the hens.  I’m not planning to test that theory, however.

So for now, I’m still waiting for my first egg.  And, although it won’t actually be worth its weight in gold, it will be a prize, nonetheless!

Resolutions

Thinking about and working in my garden is my therapy.  It makes me a happier person.  I feel productive, useful, focused, and that I contribute something to making the world a better, prettier place.  The winter season is usually no exception…In Atlanta we can still garden.  But this winter has been different.  The frigid temperatures and seemingly non-stop rains have made it impossible to have a continuously functioning and producing garden.  This has affected me.   A lot!  In the past few weeks I’ve found myself…down.  Without my stand-by outlet to get outside and work in the soil I’m a little lost. 

And, in spite of my resolution (again) to work out every day…Let’s face it, working out on a treadmill or an elliptical machine just isn’t the same as marching along with the bird chatter, sweating to the beat of yanking out heavy weeds laden with earth or digging a new bed to “heave ho”.  When I’m working out I watch the clock.  When I’m in my garden hours pass before I notice. 

What I do enjoy about this time of year is spending any spare moment paging through the accumulating seed catalogs finding yummy, unique, interesting and promising vegetables and fruits to attempt to coax into thriving in my garden.   The glossy photographs of beautiful plants with perfect fruit make me desperate to get dirty again!  Having just placed my order for a large variety of seeds, I’m anxious to set up my grow lights and await the first emerging seedlings.

I know the days are getting longer again and before I know it I’ll be putting those seedlings into the soil and tending to their every need…Happily.

Trying New Things

Sadly, I have to admit I’ve barely been to my vegetable garden in a month!  With all the Holiday “stuff” I’ve shifted it off my “to do” list almost daily.  Well, no more.  Recently, I made it a priority!

I planted lots of fall and winter vegetables, so I was excited to see what, if anything, might be available for harvesting. Boy was I thrilled!  I pulled amazing radishes for our Christmas Eve dinner.  I’ve never had radishes any way but raw, so this year I decided to try something new…roasting them.  After washing the radishes and cutting off the green tops, I cut them into chunks.  The chunks got tossed with olive oil, salt and pepper and then were put in a baking dish and cooked in a 350-degree oven for about 40 minutes.  Thinking I might need to disguise the morsels for my family to try them, I mixed them in with roasted zucchini chunks.  My kids were not excited to try this new dish…but after one bite they asked when they could have roasted radishes again and could I please not bother with the zucchini! Success!  

Currently out of the country enjoying a much-anticipated family vacation, I know when we return to Atlanta I will have lots of greens to harvest including arugula and other types of lettuces, collards, kale and Swiss chard.  I even have snow peas and beets coming in!

Soon it will be time to start dreaming of planting the spring garden…I’ll start my seeds indoors under grow lights in late January or early February, so next week I’ll start ordering from the seed catalogs.  I’m thinking of trying some melons and unique beans in 2010.  I’m feeling the need to be a little bold with my recent radish success.

chicken envy

When I got my dad his (Polish) chicken recently (when he helped me build my chicken pen), he named her “Anna” after his Polish grandmother who emigrated to the Chicago area around 1900.  Little did I know that we were setting ourselves up for “Chicken Envy”…You see, my mom, Barbara, aka Nana, looks a lot like “Anna”.  Seriously.  My mom has silver and black “spikey” hair.  Since recently “meeting” Anna, my mom has decided that (a.) Daddy should rename “his” chicken after her, or (b.)  I need to get mom her own Polish chicken that she can name “Nana”.  Hmmmm…..Quite a dilemma, huh?

The four chickens remaining, after the return of the three roosters, are getting along great.  And they have become quite “social” with me!  When I come out to check their water and feed in the evening I’ve taken to “rewarding” them for their attention with a fresh worm from my worm bin.  I wonder if Pavlov knew chickens could be conditioned like dogs…

Each evening, even if it is dark and the girls are in their coop, when they hear me or see me coming (I carry a flashlight if it is dusk or dark), they exit the coop one-by-one down the ramp and scurry over to me at the fence, anticipating their bedtime “treat”.  It is quite comical!  My vegetarian daughter even partakes in the ritual and finds it delightful to watch the girls all vie for a worm.

The girls have been enjoying their “treat” so much, that I ordered mealworms and am now doling them out liberally, much to their delight!  I hope my daughter doesn't find the box of them I have hidden in the back of the refrigerator...

Melancholy Chickens

It’s silly, I know, but I’m sad.  Yesterday I returned three of my seven chickens to the person I bought them from because they are roosters.  (I can’t have roosters in the city limits.)  He promises me he found a good home for them where they won’t end up as dinner.  I hope so.

I went out to the coop this morning to check on the remaining four…and they seemed kind of…lost.  I guess we all (chickens and human) are feeling a little melancholy today missing our fellas.  My successes, to date, on the chicken-keeping front, include the fact that I haven’t inadvertently killed any of the chickens!  I consider this a big success!  I also take credit for asking questions and listening to the answers I received.  This is not something I do on a regular basis…I like to “forge ahead” and “figure it out”.  Actually asking and listening helped me to figure out how to get the chickens to go into the coop on their own each night, helped me to get the grain ratio of organic, custom feed I am giving them right and determine which of the chickens were actually roosters.    I also feel good about the rhythm I’ve gotten into with them as far as feeding/watering/cleaning the coop is concerned.  Now, I am just awaiting the arrival of the “First Egg”.  The chickens are about 16 weeks old, which means they will begin laying sometime in the next few weeks.  The first egg usually is laid when the chickens are between 15 and 19 weeks.  I can’t wait!  Really…I CAN’T!

I’m thinking of putting a roof over part of my chicken yard as the rains we have had have turned most of the pen into nothing but mud.  The chickens don't seem to care, but I do.  I laid wheat straw down on the ground this morning to stabilize it, absorb some of the water, and add mental stimulation for the chickens.  I would feel horrible if they were melancholy AND bored.   Late last week I added two perches for them to use…and I was thrilled to see them all sitting on them this morning.

Now I have to think about getting a few more hens…

Someone Crowed!

Despite a few bumps along my path, I think the chicken keeping has been going pretty well this past month.  The chicks have been eating both the commercial feed and the seed/grain mixture I am providing, they are growing into very pretty young adult chickens and finally, last night, they figured out how to go into the coop all by themselves.  (Thanks to someone telling me to put a light bulb on a timer in the coop…like clockwork, they marched themselves in there as the sun began to set.) 

The bumps are turning out to be a bit significant…however.

Yesterday morning I discovered one of the chicks is being pecked and was bloodied.  So, I had to remove that chick and put it in the brooder where it is warm and I can nurse it’s wound.  The poor thing is beside itself being isolated from the others.  But, at the feed store, where I went to purchase a topical treatment, they told me the other chickens will keep picking where there is blood until they literally pull it apart…Ew.

Also, yesterday, as I was dealing with the injured chicken, someone crowed!  Yep…stretched out his neck and let a big old “Cockadoodle doo” out!  I live in the city limits and by law cannot keep roosters.  And, now that I’m looking at these chickens a little more closely, I’m thinking I may have 3 or 4 roosters out of the seven chickens.  Now I have to make sure and then find them new homes outside the city limits. 

And then there’s the issue of them standing out in this driving rain getting soaked.  Why won’t they go into the coop where it is warm, dry and there is both food and water?  I guess I’ll go help them out and remind them that warm and dry is better than cold and wet.