Soooo, unfortunately this is not an update to celebrate our first egg - yet! I actually have two other pieces of news to share...First, I mentioned the other day that I had placed three decoy eggs in my chicken's nesting boxes. Well, when we returned from our little trip this evening I went out to check on the ladies...when I looked in their coop, all three eggs had been moved from where I'd put them. Two had been rolled out to the main wire floor area...
The third egg had, well, you can see in the picture below what happened to that third egg. Weird! What kind of chickens crack open eggs? I'm kind of concerned! Not only have they still not laid yet, now they're being destructive! I guess I'll be taking the decoy eggs out tomorrow - especially if there is more destructive behavior!
Okay, so here's the second piece of news...yesterday while at the concert, I got a text message from my neighbor. In effect what it said was that she had heard one of my chickens crowing back and forth with her rooster while she was outside. I hate to say it, but I had kind of suspected that...I actually thought for a while that it was one of my birds that sort of has "narrow hips"...more recently though, it has seemed like Berkeley was sticking out in more than one way. She/he has been pretty aggressive with the other chickens and has been attacking them, charging them and sometimes jumping on their backs....suspicious huh? 
While sharing the news with the husband and talking about this latest development, I realized that I wouldn't want to do anything about it, until I knew for sure who it was. So when I got home and was out by the coop, I spent a few minutes watching "the girls". It didn't take long for it to become clear that my hunch that Berkeley was my potential rooster was correct. Let's just say that while I didn't see her, excuse me him, crow, I did see him in another act that left no doubt about his gender. So I now know that I've got seven hens and one rooster. I suppose I'm a little disappointed...if his crowing becomes an issue we'll have to figure out what to do with him. Roosters are not illegal here, we don't live in the city, but if Berkeley's crowing starts interrupting our sleep, he may as well be illegal!
So, hopefully the next time I have news to share about the chickens, it will be positive egg-laying news!
The third egg had, well, you can see in the picture below what happened to that third egg. Weird! What kind of chickens crack open eggs? I'm kind of concerned! Not only have they still not laid yet, now they're being destructive! I guess I'll be taking the decoy eggs out tomorrow - especially if there is more destructive behavior!
Okay, so here's the second piece of news...yesterday while at the concert, I got a text message from my neighbor. In effect what it said was that she had heard one of my chickens crowing back and forth with her rooster while she was outside. I hate to say it, but I had kind of suspected that...I actually thought for a while that it was one of my birds that sort of has "narrow hips"...more recently though, it has seemed like Berkeley was sticking out in more than one way. She/he has been pretty aggressive with the other chickens and has been attacking them, charging them and sometimes jumping on their backs....suspicious huh? While sharing the news with the husband and talking about this latest development, I realized that I wouldn't want to do anything about it, until I knew for sure who it was. So when I got home and was out by the coop, I spent a few minutes watching "the girls". It didn't take long for it to become clear that my hunch that Berkeley was my potential rooster was correct. Let's just say that while I didn't see her, excuse me him, crow, I did see him in another act that left no doubt about his gender. So I now know that I've got seven hens and one rooster. I suppose I'm a little disappointed...if his crowing becomes an issue we'll have to figure out what to do with him. Roosters are not illegal here, we don't live in the city, but if Berkeley's crowing starts interrupting our sleep, he may as well be illegal!So, hopefully the next time I have news to share about the chickens, it will be positive egg-laying news!
Posts
My mom used golf balls as decoy eggs -- chickens can't destroy them! Only one chicken has started laying. It's all chronicled here -- Cluck-cluck-here.
ReplyDeleteI used to raise hens and loved the eggs!
ReplyDeleteYour hens probably don't like the presence of another hens' eggs. Decoy eggs are usually marble or wood. No scents from other birds.
How old are your hens? Is it getting cool/cold where you live? Both age and temp are factors in laying of eggs.
The neighbor that gave me my original 3 hens loaned me a most eggcellent book: (Sorry, couldn't resist) Chickens In Your Backyard: A Beginner's Guide by Chickens In Your Backyard: A Beginner's Guide. It helped me a lot.
I miss my hens...........
I would be really careful leaving eggs in the coop. (I didn't realize your decoys were real eggs or I would have warned you about it.) You don't want your chickens to learn that the insides are tasty. Once they do it is almost impossible to break them of this. An egg-eater in your flock is bad news. Golf balls work great.
ReplyDeleteI got 4 new barred rocks and one cuckoo maran (chocolate colored eggs!) pullets today. They're about 3 months old. Hopefully they'll be laying in the next couple of months, but with the days getting shorter, I'll not hold my breath.
Jayne