Icy but busy

Lovely Frizz, she is a fantastic girl

What a new year it has been. Birds getting moved, rabbits getting their hutch adjusted, slipping and sliding about on flows of ridiculous ice. Peg is learning to stand and cruise. Walking is just around the corner, heaven help us. She gets into things already just zooming around crawling. We are sure to have our hands full.

Part of the flock

Monday, I cleaned out the chicken coop and nest boxes, they were a week or more past due. The floor was just plain nasty. That being said my version of just plain nasty isn't really all that bad, I just like my coop as clean as I can keep it. Mucking it out took less than an hour, the floor has a full bale of shavings from Runnings on it, and the nest boxes are full of chaff hay. I'll probably need to clean them out and rebed them as the pullets and cockerels I moved up from the turkey tractor seem to think it is a swell game to yank the stems of hay out.

My beautiful mottled girl

Another project that was undertaken by my siblings and I was the rearranging of the pullets, cockerels, Laura, Reggie and the peahen. I was having a misery of a time trying to get up to the small barn the pea was kept in. So, Alan, Becky and I moved all but Laura, Reg and one small bit of a pullet up into the main coop. There was the expected scuffling and pecking as the order was reestablished. Laura, Reggie and the single moved into the grow out portion of the rabbit hutch. That is, by the way, working out surprisingly well. I think perhaps the solution for where to put the bantie pair is to build them their own hutch like coop.

Nesting EE hen, she lays fantastic huge eggs

After that we all trekked carefully on tip toes up to the pea's barn. Peafowl are friendly group creatures and after the loss of Mr P she'd been on her own. We caught 'er up and moved her down into  the now empty turkey tractor, got her a pan waterer and a feed stand and several chunks of hay. She is now very happy and chortles to me when I come in to feed or water. 

Some of the youngsters with my Wyandott and a Cochin

The husband and I are looking for incubators to get started on hatching chicks. We'd like to hatch out our own Cochins, and some production layer crosses. This will mean we need to build ourselves some brooders for after they hatch and some more coops, as we have to sort the cochins from the rest of the flock. A friend of ours is helping us sell eggs to friends of his, so we have a little income from all our girls. IF we can hatch out enough cochins we'll keep what we want and sell the rest to get a bit of buy more birds money. (Granted we also plan to buy more young birds anyways, but it is nice to get a bit of money first).

Miss Peahen, perfectly happy 

Today, I already have chores just about finished. I'm going to borrow the parent's Durango. as the brakes in my Jeep went around the bend, and go get my hair done and do some grocery purchasing. Peg's other grandparents are going to watch her for an hour or so to give me a baby squawking free shopping and hair doing experience. I haven't had my hair professionally done since I was pregnant with Peggy over a year ago. The thought of a nice wash, trim and layer is just divine! Thank you darling husband for suggesting I go pamper myself for a little bit!