It should be pretty clear by now that I love my chickens. I'd love to have more chickens. Hell, I'd love to start a chicken farm. From hanging out watching them to caring for them and the coop, I've spent a fair amount of time with my girls since we got them a little over a year ago. I was thinking the other day about the things I use or the ways I take care of the girls and realized the things I do are a collection of ideas I've picked up from here and there from books I've read or websites I've perused. So, to start off 2012 I want to share the things that make my chicken-tending a little nicer.
Garden shoes. They are the best thing to happen to chicken mucking. That is, they are the best thing to happen to a person who gets the pleasure of scraping giant chicken droppings out of a chicken run and coop. I already had a pair of slip-on rubber garden shoes that I used, of course, for gardening. I started using them for convenience when I'd go out to shut the coop door at night. They were always by the coat rack, so I'd slip them on, get my coat, and head out to close in the girls. When I'd go out to open the coop in the morning, I initially wore the shoes I was going to wear to work that day. I changed over to the garden shoes after the day I got to work and realized I'd stepped in some poopy mud and it was stuck to my shoe and getting all over the break room floor. And that's all she wrote. Whenever I go out back and it has anything to do with the girls, I'm now wearing my green garden shoes. They're solid rubber without any fabric, so if they get too gross I can hose them down and leave them in the sun to dry. They're pretty sweet when it comes to chickening.
To make my shoe experience even more suited for a lazy person, I bought a medium-sized plastic dog food bin that has a hinged lid on top. I leave that sucker on our back step and drop my shoes in there before I head in the back door. No E. coli on my kitchen floor, thank you. See, we don't have a back porch. We only have a back step. I don't like to keep any of my shoes outside on the back step because I'm paranoid about a poisonous spider climbing into one of my shoes. I remember seeing a show on T.V. that reenacted the story of a woman who got bitten by a Black Widow that had crawled in one of her shoes she kept in the garage. I don't know why I watch these types of programs. They only make me more of a freak. Ever since then I've been scared that I'll be bitten by a Black Widow or some other horrible spider if I leave my shoes outside and I'll fall over and die. Though I just Googled it and read on the Mayo Clinic's website that apparently a Black Widow spider bite is rarely lethal. I'm not taking any chances. The practical use for the bin is that I can leave my shoes outside no matter the weather. Yes, the shoes can get wet, but I don't want to have to put my feet in soaking wet shoes to go out the coop. I also don't want to have to dry them off in the morning when I'm hauling it to get off to work. On the rare occasion we get snow, it's nice not to have to scoop snow out of my shoes either. So even if you're not a crazy freak like I am, the bin is not a bad idea.
Feeding the chickens takes up quite a deal of my chicken chores, so my last awesome chicken ideas have to do with food accessories. We keep our chicken food in a trash can in our shed. I keep the food in the bag, so I can put two or three different bags in the trash can. We usually have chicken food, scratch, and oyster shell bags all in the same trash can. It saves a lot of space. The trash can is necessetated by the fact that we get mice in the shed some times. To make filling our chicken feeder easier, my awesome idea was to cut the top off a milk jug at an angle, leaving the handle in tact. I fill the jug with food and only take that into the coop to fill the feeder. This way I'm not hauling the heavy food bag back and forth every time. I also cut off the bottom of a 2-liter soda bottle, drilled a few holes in it and attached it to the inside of the run with zip ties, so it's hanging off the hardware cloth where the girls can reach it. We put crushed oyster shell in it, so they'll have access to it whenever they feel like they need their calcium. The holes in the bottom are important! Without the holes, you'll have oyster paste the first time you get a good rain. I may or may not know this fact from experience. Next to the oyster shell feeder I hanged ("Hanged" is grammatically correct. Trust me. Hung is not a real word. It's slang.) a suet feeder that I use for treats, usually greens, so they can go to town on them. They tear at that thing like crazy little velociraptors. If you've ever doubted whether dinosaurs were related to birds, watch a flock attach a suet feeder full of cabbage.
I've got a few more good ideas, but I'll save those for later. There are twelve new months this year that I need to fill. Enjoy.
Showing posts with label Feeding. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Feeding. Show all posts
Monday, January 2, 2012
Monday, August 22, 2011
The Food Man/The Food Lady
Chickens are ravenous beasts. They would have you believe that they are starving to death every time you come around with food. That's just because they know we're suckers. Because we are.
My husband and I joke that the chickens refer to us as The Food Man and The Food Lady because that's all we're good for. As soon as our chickens hear the back door open, they start pecking at the hardware cloth on the door of their pen and fighting to be the one in front when we get out there. Every morning before I head out to my day job, I bring them a treat. It usually consists of a variety of scraps or, sometimes, when I don't have any good leftovers or something they'll like (they can be picky little divas about their food), I bring them a piece of bread. When I unlock the door and start to open it, I have to shoo them back so I can toss them the treats or put treats in their suet feeder - the suet feeder was a great idea. At 7:30 in the morning, I'm not trying to have to chase them back into the pen after having only five or ten minutes of forage time (they do not like to cooperate when they don't think they're getting their way, which is more diva attitude I'm afraid). I generally step inside the run (it's around 8 feet high, so I can easily walk around in there) blocking the door and throw some treats on the ground while I check out everyone and say my good mornings. The girls generally are looking for me when I head out the back door and will let me know if I'm running late by making some inpatient squawking noises. They know when it's time for The Food Lady to make an appearance.
God forbid I go out to check for eggs without a treat. They make me feel horrible about myself, like I'm a bad chicken mommy. They'll do their clucking and clamoring to be front in line at the pen's door, but when it becomes obvious that you aren't there to let them out of give them treats, they start making mean noises. I swear they get mean look on their faces too! If it's possible for chickens to furrow their brow, mine do it.
Whenever my husband or I got out to let the chickens free-range in the backyard, we bring treats. Again, it's usually a variety of leftovers and tidbits from the kitchen that we know they'll like. Favorite things include bread, rice, tomatoes, cooked pasta, meat (they are lovers or pork and beef), melon, cooked or uncooked squash, and pizza crust. Generally, we throw some pieces of whatever we've got on the ground when we first let them into the yard. A few of our girls will head out to their favorite forage spots once the initial treats are gone, but a few stick around to make sure you aren't hoarding any other delicious food items, which we usually do. We had to start bringing out a container with a lid so we could keep the chickens out of whatever we have left. See, we keep a little on hand to help coax everyone back into the run when free time is over. At one point Pouncey became hip to our jive and started jumping onto the table in the backyard and eating off of the plate or out of the bowl that held the bribe. Then Bossy followed suit. Neither hen is easily dissuaded. Hence the container with a lid.
One thing I did not expect when we got chickens was how much they have their own tastes. I assumed all chickens liked the same things. You can throw anything out for them to eat and some of them will look at you like you're crazy while others are gobbling it down. Our biggest diva, Bossy, is probably our pickiest eater. She likes carbs - bread, rolls, rice, pita, pizza crust. She does not appreciate new things and will not "take one small bite," which we tell our four-year-old son when there are new things on the dinner table. She hates squash and hard boiled eggs and nectarines...and the list goes on. Two of our hens are in the middle in terms of pickiness: Pouncey and Erickson. Occasionally they will pass on something, usually types of squash or eggplant, in order to grab up all the rice or breadcrumbs, but they'll usually get in on whatever action there is to be had. The babies, our nine-week-old Japanese/Old English Game bantams, are also moderately picky eaters. They'll eat most anything, but do favor some foods over others. Finally there's Ochocinco. She is a garbage disposal. We should have named her piglet because she likes to eat and she's not picky. If it's edible, I cannot imagine her turning it down.
It's not a bad job being The Food Lady. It's probably my favorite part of being a chicken mommy. Chickens love treats and if you have some, they love you too. Plus, our girls will take treats out of your hand and I love it. I'm not above bribery to make them like me.
My husband and I joke that the chickens refer to us as The Food Man and The Food Lady because that's all we're good for. As soon as our chickens hear the back door open, they start pecking at the hardware cloth on the door of their pen and fighting to be the one in front when we get out there. Every morning before I head out to my day job, I bring them a treat. It usually consists of a variety of scraps or, sometimes, when I don't have any good leftovers or something they'll like (they can be picky little divas about their food), I bring them a piece of bread. When I unlock the door and start to open it, I have to shoo them back so I can toss them the treats or put treats in their suet feeder - the suet feeder was a great idea. At 7:30 in the morning, I'm not trying to have to chase them back into the pen after having only five or ten minutes of forage time (they do not like to cooperate when they don't think they're getting their way, which is more diva attitude I'm afraid). I generally step inside the run (it's around 8 feet high, so I can easily walk around in there) blocking the door and throw some treats on the ground while I check out everyone and say my good mornings. The girls generally are looking for me when I head out the back door and will let me know if I'm running late by making some inpatient squawking noises. They know when it's time for The Food Lady to make an appearance.
God forbid I go out to check for eggs without a treat. They make me feel horrible about myself, like I'm a bad chicken mommy. They'll do their clucking and clamoring to be front in line at the pen's door, but when it becomes obvious that you aren't there to let them out of give them treats, they start making mean noises. I swear they get mean look on their faces too! If it's possible for chickens to furrow their brow, mine do it.
Whenever my husband or I got out to let the chickens free-range in the backyard, we bring treats. Again, it's usually a variety of leftovers and tidbits from the kitchen that we know they'll like. Favorite things include bread, rice, tomatoes, cooked pasta, meat (they are lovers or pork and beef), melon, cooked or uncooked squash, and pizza crust. Generally, we throw some pieces of whatever we've got on the ground when we first let them into the yard. A few of our girls will head out to their favorite forage spots once the initial treats are gone, but a few stick around to make sure you aren't hoarding any other delicious food items, which we usually do. We had to start bringing out a container with a lid so we could keep the chickens out of whatever we have left. See, we keep a little on hand to help coax everyone back into the run when free time is over. At one point Pouncey became hip to our jive and started jumping onto the table in the backyard and eating off of the plate or out of the bowl that held the bribe. Then Bossy followed suit. Neither hen is easily dissuaded. Hence the container with a lid.
One thing I did not expect when we got chickens was how much they have their own tastes. I assumed all chickens liked the same things. You can throw anything out for them to eat and some of them will look at you like you're crazy while others are gobbling it down. Our biggest diva, Bossy, is probably our pickiest eater. She likes carbs - bread, rolls, rice, pita, pizza crust. She does not appreciate new things and will not "take one small bite," which we tell our four-year-old son when there are new things on the dinner table. She hates squash and hard boiled eggs and nectarines...and the list goes on. Two of our hens are in the middle in terms of pickiness: Pouncey and Erickson. Occasionally they will pass on something, usually types of squash or eggplant, in order to grab up all the rice or breadcrumbs, but they'll usually get in on whatever action there is to be had. The babies, our nine-week-old Japanese/Old English Game bantams, are also moderately picky eaters. They'll eat most anything, but do favor some foods over others. Finally there's Ochocinco. She is a garbage disposal. We should have named her piglet because she likes to eat and she's not picky. If it's edible, I cannot imagine her turning it down.
It's not a bad job being The Food Lady. It's probably my favorite part of being a chicken mommy. Chickens love treats and if you have some, they love you too. Plus, our girls will take treats out of your hand and I love it. I'm not above bribery to make them like me.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)