Eggs in the nest boxes are few and far between these days. Maybe one a week. And, all of a sudden, they are the wrong color! It happened again yesterday – a white egg in the north nest box. We have only three chickens now – a Barred Rock, a...
Even the most recalcitrant chickens know that bunnies have nothing whatsoever to do with Easter. Fluffy little chicks, yes. Bunnies bearing baskets of colored eggs, definitely not. And don't ever bring up that discussion with Aracaunas or...
Trying to explain Daylight Savings Time to chickens is a lot like getting them to fuggedabout the pecking order. It ain't gonna to happen. Before the time changed, the girls were going to roost just when I was sitting down to dinner -- 5:45ish. ...
Slutvana, our Russian Orloff, spent most of last summer and fall in a nest box -- any one of the three we have. She didn't seem particular. She wasn't laying and she wasn't broody. Talk with her as I might, she wasn't about to reveal the cause...
I gathered the girls together this morning for a little talk. I was pretty sure they'd been lurking in the crawl space under the house yesterday -- listening to the TV. I was interested in their take on happenings beyond the coop. Of course,...
They come to the east door every afternoon about 1:00 or 1:30. Up on the porch, up on the threshold. Clucking and tapping with their beaks against the window panes. "Farmer Nyel, Farmer Nyel, let us come in," they say. They hop up the steps to...
I had just finished writing my blog about chickens' sleeping habits yesterday when I went to let the girls out of the coop and found Ms. Clara toes up just behind the roost. I've heard about chickens that fall off the roost and break their necks,...
According to recent studies, one out of three of us in the United States is sleep deprived. We stay up too late, we get up too early, our sleep is not "quality" sleep. For whatever reasons, too many of us are unable to function at maximum...
No wind, No rain. Cold, crisp, blue skies! "Perfect for an outside tetherball tournament!" said Farmer Nyel, So he sent me out to the chickens armed with a big fresh cabbage and I dutifully attached it to the tetherball rope in the chicken run. ...
Now that the tide has decided to stay within its normal boundaries and not wander around while high, Lake Little has also resumed it's usual winter size. Granted, it fluctuates with the amount of rain we must all endure, but it seems to call out...
When I become curious about a part of Pacific County history, my first go-to place for information is the Sou-wester -- quarterly magazine of the Pacific County Historical Society. This morning, after taking breakfast to our girls, I got to...
It can't be said too clearly or too often -- you never can tell with chickens. Take this smokey 209 air quality index number that we are enduring in Oysterville, for instance. There have been few complaints from our girls. In fact, that may be...