New chickens.  Today we have new chickens.  We had chickens last year, some production reds, and then we had some Old English Bantams.  The rooster was real pretty, but he disappeared one day.  Since then the girls have not had a fellow around to give them protection.  Earlier this week we had an opportunity to do a trade, so we traded one of our production reds for three roosters.  The fellow who had the roosters said he was getting tired of all the crowing.  Since we have ten young hens that will be laying here in a few weeks we can afford to let go of one of the older hens.  So, we did the trade.  We got two barred rock roosters and one big dark colored rooster of uncertain breed, but he is pretty.  Now the girls have plenty of guys around to give them protection and, well, companionship.

Mark giving the chickens their daily afternoon scratch feed.

It didn't take long at all for the fellows to get very well acquainted with the girls.  One of the roosters has been following the big production red hen around ever since we brought him home.


This is a tomato hornworm.

You may ask, what does a tomato hornworm have to do with chickens?  Well, I noticed that something has been consuming our tomato plants.  With some investigation, I found this creature.  A tomato hornworm.  I fed the thing to the chickens.  They ate it.  It did take them a while to figure out that the thing is good to eat, though.  With more checking I found more hornworms.  Lots more.  So I have been feeding the chickens.  They have figured out that tomato hornworms are tasty treats.  That big production red hen and I are real good buddies.  She comes along with me when I check out the tomato plants.  Yesterday when I was checking the tomato plants she kept jumping and snapping at a tomato leaf.  I couldn't understand why until I found a big hornworm attached to the underside of the leaf.  I pulled it off and gave it to her.  She ate it.  Then I found a great big one on a potato leaf.  I gave it to her, but the rooster snapped it up, instead.  Why are they called hornworms?  Because they have that bright red horn-shaped thing on their tail end.  When they are completely still on a tomato stem, they are almost invisible.  You grab them and pull them off, and they squirm and try to bite you, and hit at you with that horn thing, and then they throw up nasty green stuff to make you let go of them.  They are like a big fat balloon.  The chickens snap at them with their beaks, and work on them for a while until they deflate, like letting all the air out of a balloon, and then down they go.

This is the chicken house.  Two houses.

We have three chicken houses.  I know, it is a lot.  The small one on the right is the one we started with many years ago.  It is heavily insulated, so it is very warm in winter.  I recently re-sided it with new plywood all over the outside, and new roofing material, and a new nesting box on the back.  The big chicken house on the left was there when we moved to the new place a year ago.  It is a metal building with a fiberglass roof, not insulated, but well-ventilated.  I did a lot of work recently to get it all cleaned out and renovated.  I built some new nesting boxes for it.  So it is in good condition now.  It is much larger and it will accommodate up to twenty chickens.  The one on the right will hold only about six or seven.  So, right now all the chickens are housed in the big house.  The small one is unoccupied.  When it gets cold,  I might try to move some of the hens to the small house, but chickens don't like change, so we'll see how it goes.  The third chicken house is what I call my summer house.  I built it at the last place.  It is a metal building.  I painted it white to keep it from getting too hot in the summer sun.  I haven't used it, since we have this metal chicken house that works just fine.  I may end up getting rid of it since we don't use it.