Sunday Evening

It was a lazy afternoon at Red Door Coop.  The weather was drowsy, we were drowsy, and the birds bathed in the dirt. Then they pecked around the coop before chicken bedtime.

Bill munched on some oyster shells.  BB posed stoically while pecking at my pink toenails between shots.  Fitz supervised.

 Bill sang.  Weezy stuttered her way around, a bit nervous as always.  BB posed some more.

Lou was having a little alone time on the other side of the coop/

Flight

I was hanging out with the chickens this afternoon when Lou "took flight" in the flappy, jumpy, clumsy way that chickens take flight. 

First she flew to the stump.

Thank she flew to the loft.

She quickly flew down because there were not treats up there. 

The Dead Chicken

No, not one of ours.

Do you remember when I stayed at the farm this summer and found a dead chicken?  Then I brought it back to life?  Well, the dead chicken just hatched chicks.  Cecelia found them yesterday up in the same barn where I raised the mother hen from the dead. 

Go ahead, read about the dead chicken.

Now read about the zombie chicken mother.
 

Progress

We've been happy to see that Weezy is holding her own a bit better with the older chickens.  She and Lou were seen eating out of the same dish at the same time a few times.  That's what we call progress. 

Weezy and Fitz

Lou

BB

 Behind Bill

Pickings...

I'll pick tomatoes a few more times this week, and then we will say goodbye to this summer's garden. 

Veggie Time

We give the chickens greens and other vegetable scraps every day.  It's a healthy treat that they love.

Here are Fitz, Bill, and BB waiting for veg.

And here are all the girls, munching away.

Five Eggs, Four Golf Balls

Where's Lou?

I didn't post any pictures of Lou in the last few days.  There's no particular reason except that she kept popping out of the camera frame.  Then she popped back in.

Here are all the chickens. 

Tonight will be our first cold night in a long while.  Girls are tucked in tight.

Neighborhood Kitty

Belle is a frequent visitor to Red Door Coop.  She lives just across the street from us.  She is a hunter, as evidenced by the mice and snakes she leaves on her owner's stoop, so I would never trust her with the chickens.  However, the time Belle spends at our house is focused.  Mice.  There is a mouse in the compost and another still hanging out in the coop.  Probably more than one, I know.  But we like to think it is just one in each spot.  Belle will lay next to the compost or one corner of the coop for hours, totally ignoring the chickens, waiting for the mice.

A while back, Papa Hen ripped out the floor of the coop and rebuilt it to keep the mouse out.  It seems that the mouse won.  Look what we discovered last weekend.  Mouse hole.

This weekend, Papa Hen fought back, tearing out the floor again and making it impenetrable. 
We hope. 

Colt

We visit our friend's ranch as often as we can.  This year, we've been watching a beautiful little colt grow bigger and taller with each visit.  On this ranch, the animals earn their names over time, after the ranchers and friends get to know them.  This sweet little colt is still nameless.  Suggestions?

BB and Weezy

The new girls, the young girls, are doing well.  Weezy is the most flighty of all the birds and gets spooked by everything.  Poor thing gets picked on a bit by the old girls, but she is holding her own.

BB is a total sweetheart (unlike her namesake human who gave me a really hard time for being away from the blog so much lately--gotcha, Bruiser!).  Anyway, BB seems to like being held.  If chickens can have passions, hers is being outside of the coop.  But she is a flexible bird and does well in the coop too.  BB and Weezy stick together like glue.

Fitz and Bill

Our original chickens, Fitz and Bill, are doing well, despite their ongoing molting.  Fitz is not laying eggs quite as regularly lately, but that could change.  She's never been one to stick to a routine.

Bill is still on the loud side, but does have some competition for the position of loudest hen from Weezy, one of our new girls.  Here is Bill deciding on this morning's nesting box.

Morning Dew

I'm not sure that the chickens dig the Grateful Dead, but I do.  The chickens are more interested in digging for worms!  Anyway, Morning Dew was locked in my head this morning.  We let the chickens out early and they ran out of the coop onto the lawn.  The hens bathed themselves in the wet grass and ate the plentiful worms. 

Of course, they eventually moved over to the mulch side of the yard.  There are good worms there too.

September 1

Hello.  We've missed you!  Here's my excuse: school started!  It's been a busy couple of weeks.  Red Door Coop is looking great.

The chickens are still getting along well and we were tickled to see them all in the dirt bath today.  At the same time.