Chickens

Emily and I have been planning to get chickens ever since we traveled up to Michigan and saw her parents' birds. Shortly after we moved, Emily's family was in town, and her dad and brother helped me construct a chicken coop. Although the design is simple, its original.

The folks who lived in our house before us had an old dog kennel behind the shed. I restrung parts of that fence, and then added chicken wire along the bottom. I haven't yet put netting over the top, but that is the plan.

We were having trouble finding good chicks. I was particularly interested in getting a good breed, possibly an heirloom. Most of what was available for us locally were commercial breeds, which I wasn't real excited about. Eventually we contacted our friend David, who raises free range chicken for a living, and he gave us the phone number for a guy not far from our house.

Well, I called him, and it turned out that he had chicks, at different ages, in two different breeds: Buckeye and Cornish. I don't really care for Cornishes, but I was intrigued by the Buckeyes. Apparently they're a critically endangered heirloom breed developed in the late 1890's in Ohio. They're the only American breed developed by a woman, Nettie Metcalf. Buckeyes are also on the Slow Food USA Ark of Taste for their endangered status. They were described to me as looking like athletic Rhode Island Reds. So I got four six-week old chicks. I wanted to get newborns, but the guy I got them from wasn't able to sex them at that age, and I really don't want a rooster. So, my only option if I wanted just hens was to get six week olds.

Also, the guy we got the chicks from is a member of the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy, a pretty cool organization that he told me is solely responsible for bringing Buckeyes back from extinction a few years ago. In addition to chickens, this guy also raises rare heirloom Guinea hogs, but I think we're a few years from getting a pig.

At first they were pretty timid, staying in or around the coop. But now, after two weeks, they've gotten pretty comfortable with their surroundings. Olive is also very intrigued by them. She'll sit for a long time just watching them. She doesn't bother them too much, but they've never met without a fence between them.