We have eggs!!

Yesterday we noticed our chickens making this horrible racket. BOC BOC BOC BOC BOC BOCBOCBOCBOCBOC BAWKBAWKBAWKBAWK!!!!!. I thought, "Well there goes the whole 'chickens are quiet and great for a neighborhood' idea."

And then one of the girls noticed that "Melody" AKA "The Alpha Chick" was in the coop by herself. And a little while later we had a beautiful brown TINY egg! Which was passed from girl to girl to girl to Mom and never was a chicken egg more adored than that little egg was. I'm telling you, it will be a little sad to crack that thing open tomorrow morning.

We came home from some errands and found another egg right next to the back porch step. It was a little larger but still small and I suspected our Australorp, Black Berry. Crazy that two chickens laid their first eggs within hours of each other! Our girls are synchronized! And today we were gifted with two more eggs, right on schedule and by the same girls who laid yesterday (it was the Australorp--I caught her in the nesting box). Hopefully the other two will decide to join in!

It was really hard to concentrate on getting work done yesterday and today because we all wanted to run out and see if there were any more eggs. I was just as bad as the kids. I found all sorts of excuses to walk by the coop. Oh what fun it is to have chickens!!

The girls spotted Jerry, the neighborhood oppossum in our backyard last night. I hear that oppossoms like to eat chickens and I've found some digging around our coop. We put Christmas lights up and that was the end of the digging marks. I wonder if old Jerry is getting braver though. I don't think he can bust into the coop but we are going to further reinforce it this weekend. Hardware cloth my friends. The big guns. No one gets a free chicken dinner on our watch.

Off to do something besides read about, write about, or think about chickens. The obsession is being put up on the shelf for the evening--after I take another peek at our precious little clutch of eggs!

Snow Birds

The recent cold weather was not easy on the chickens (or their momma). We left them outside during the first day of the sub-freezing temperatures. They seemed okay, patrolling the yard like usual. But later I noticed that they were bunching up and looking pretty cold. So I wimped out and brought them into their cardboard box in the garage.



We realized they would probably be happier with a little more room so we took a second box and made a little apartment for them. Sort of like a chicken tenement. They stayed there from Tuesday afternoon until Friday afternoon. It all went well until the final night when they decided to escape. I came out into the garage on Friday morning and they were roosting on some chairs that go to a table we were going to Freecycle. Looks like I'll have some cleaning up to do. Gross!



As soon as it hit 25 degrees on Friday morning I threw the birds outside. They clucked loudly at the snow but soon decided they were so happy to be at the end of their confinement a little white cold stuff on the ground wasn't a big deal.




I hope they enjoyed their pampering b/c they are back out to shiver in their coop at night after their little escape stunt during the last freeze. Well, except for tomorrow when the highs are in the 20's--they are in their box tonight with some heavy baskets on top of the screen lids. I am a mother hen myself after all--can't bear for my little princess chickies to suffer! :)

Brief Central Texas Winter

Besides the horrendous cedar allergies, central Texas is a great place to live during the winter. We usually enjoy a daytime temperature of around 60 degrees give or take 5 degrees. But God must enjoy reminding us of how good we have it down here because most winters we get at least one blast of artic air that tends to last for a day or two. Everyone joyfully busts out the scarves, gloves, and fire logs and we shiver for the day and then the temperatures rebound to where they should be and life goes on.

This year we got an extra dose of winter. We stayed below freezing for 72 hours--extremely unusal for this area. Schools had delayed openings, we had rolling blackouts, pipes froze, plants died, and we had wind chill advisories. As a reward for our 4 days of winter suffering (equivilant to 4 months of winter suffering for all other areas of the country), The Lord sent us some snow to enjoy. First He sent us a bit of freezing rain though so that shut the city down and then came the snow so schools and businesses were closed and most people got a genuine snow day. And sure enough, the day following the snow saw temperatures in the upper 60's. God bless Texas!



We aren't putting the winter gear away quite yet. We have the chance for an ice storm tomorrow morning. Highs in the 20's and then we'll probably be done with our winter weather for the season! Garden time is right around the corner!