Last year's horrible odds did not prevent us from trying again on chicks this year. Last year we purchased a total of six chicks. One died within a few days and three of them turned out to be roosters. So we still have two of our chicks from last year's batch - Delta and Blue. They are great layers and have melded in with the original chickens very well, of which there are three left. (We lost one last October.) I seem to remember declaring that we were not going to pick chicks from IFA again - especially because we learned that the chickens we get, small ones called Bantams, do not get examined for gender like the bigger chickens do. However, it is very tempting when you go to IFA and see the large carts full of sweet baby chicks chirping away so alluringly. We could not resist. Also we figured that there was no way the odds could be that bad again. And we were right! The odds were bad, but not THAT bad.
We picked out a new breed this year - Frizzled Bantams. Well, three of the four we picked out were this breed. And we saw Chase making eyes at a breed called the Japanese Bantam - hey, why not? He picked out a sweet and very tiny little one of those and three of the frizzled. Two of them looked pretty frizzled already (long frizzy feathers) and one was just white and puffy, but Emma had her heart set on that one so she came home with us too.
The kids of course deliberated for a while on their names - in times like these, when new and exciting things are happening, the kids meld into this unified team and they came up with some very cute names. The two frizzled bantams, one orange and one black, became Liz the Frizz and Burnt Toast, respectively. Liz is pictured above, along with the Japanese Bantam, who got the name Momo. The last, Emma's little puff ball, got the name Sweetie. I'm happy to report that Sweetie is living up to her name. She's small, very light weight, so so so so soft and fluffy, and an absolute sweetheart. I may even dare to say that she's snuggly.
Interestingly the chicks were not THAT big of a deal for us this year. The kids happily took care of them but didn't really play with them the same way, constantly check on them the same way, or seem as devastated as last year when we heard the first cock-a-doodle-do
We had suspicions on the gender of Liz and Toast very early on. Sadly these are the two that are actually really frizzled, but they were big, they had huge combs on their heads and they were bossy. It took until about June but yes, we heard crowing loud and clear and so we had to carefully spy on them to confirm who the culprits were. We still had a few tears from Emma, but not the absolute heartbreak of last year.
I'm declaring it once again this year. No more chicks from IFA. (You must hold me to this next year.) We will do mail order or something.
Happily we still have two of our chicks and they are awesome. Sweetie has these long feathers over her feet and is just gentle and silky. I wish she were my lap dog. Momo is tiny! So little and can fly. Actually Sweetie could a little bit too - we had to clip both of their wings. That was nerve-racking the first time! Now we're used to it - we've had to do it multiple times with Momo since she seems to want to roost in the trees at night. She barely even looks like a chicken. More like a road-runner or little hawk or something. But she loves perching on your shoulder and arms and hands - very happy to hang out. Darn that chicken poop - if it weren't so unpredictable and stinky I would seriously want to hang out with them like normal people pets. You know, like our other ones... the tortoise and lizard....wait. I think there's something wrong with us.
No comments:
Post a Comment