For some odd reason I have always wanted a flock of chickens. We decided to venture into having a flock before we moved to the farm. My husband and I built a coop and a friend gave me two Delaware chickens to start my colony off with. I had always wanted bantam chickens but decided I would try my luck with the Delaware’s first. I grew up in the city and knew absolutely nothing about chickens, let alone raising them, so big chickens seemed like a good starting bird.

So there I was with two chickens, and I named my new birds (a hen and a rooster) Lunch and Dinner. Dinner being the rooster and Lunch the hen, they did surprisingly well and Lunch soon started laying an egg a day. I felt pretty confident so I decided to get a few more chickens and this time I chose Silkie chickens. These were the chickens I had always wanted.

I knew if we were to remain a happy and calm household I had to get the dogs used to the chickens and vice versa. I started by showing the chickens to the dogs and eventually led up letting the chickens out with one dog at a time. Eventually the chickens would come out of their house when they would see the dogs, the dogs would greet the chickens and the chickens would chirp for the dogs.

When we moved into the farm we decided to get Guinea hens. We were told they would help with the tick problem and the stink bugs. So far they seem to have helped but guinea hens are loud and not so bright. They are constantly getting stuck outside the fence and then forgetting they can fly. Oh well, at least they eat some of the bugs. Our chickens are much smarter then the guineas and right now we are up to 13 hens, two roosters and four baby chickens too young to know what sex they are. In the long days of summer our chickens produce anywhere from five to nine eggs a day but in the winter their egg production drops considerably. We recently decided to try and hatch out our own eggs and for the first time incubating eggs, it went pretty well. We ended up with four baby chickens and hopefully soon these babies will join our flock outside and be happy healthy egg laying birds.

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