Wednesday, June 10, 2009

The Hens Hate Us

In case you didn't know, we brought home two one year old Silkie hens from my mom's house a couple weekends ago. Not only do Henny Penny and Hazel hate us, but they're not doing what they're supposed to do and this has me worried.

They don't eat out of their feeder, use the roosting pole, eat yummy veggie treats, lay eggs (except one) and they sure don't stink. We did have one VERY large poop today - good news!

And here I thought the chicks were going to be the hard ones - we brought home two of those as well - they're in the house.

Because I'm a "problem solver," I went in their coop today to see if I could make things a little better for them. I started by raking up their old shavings - this got them all in a tizzy. Henny Penny started squawking and flapping around. Ok. The rake is bad. Hazel then made an attempt to get away from Henny Penny and got a hand full of clean shavings dropped on her head - oops. Now she really hates me. They eventually calmed down and hid in the coop corner. I quickly finished adding the new shavings, and threw down some feed AND scratch on the coop floor. Head down - I left the coop.

I hope they come out of their hiding spot soon to eat their food - I need to see more big poops before I'm happy. Next, we'll work on laying eggs.

If you look closely at the picture, you can see them in far right (the dark spot) laying on top of each other (next to an urn of our outdoor cat's ashes). Poor things. I'm sure eventually they'll learn to tolerate us.

But The Chicks Love Us

Brownie and Buttercup are a true joy. They entertain us like little comedians. I've heard people say they watch their chickens, now I know what they're talking about. These little guys are eating, drinking, and pooping A LOT. All good signs. They actually poop so much that we have to clean their brooder at least once a day.
We're not quite sure if we have hens or roosters yet - it appears that Buttercup has a couple pink feathers so may be a rooster. If we do end up with a rooster we're going to try to keep him anyway - since we don't have rules against this in our town. It's only a problem if he gets too noisy & the neighbors complain. My neighbors love me.

One neighbor did have a rooster for a bit and only got rid of him because he was getting mean. We'll see. I'm not one to give up pets...

These little guys have a couple more weeks in the house before we'll start introducing them to the chicken coop. We're still not sure if one of the hens in the coop is their mom. Maybe that's why they hate us?

4 comments:

  1. Adorable! I'm sorry the hens are upset--hopefully they'll get over it and begin to love you and their new house.
    -Michelle

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  2. Good luck if you do end up with a rooster! I thought I could keep Red, used to follow me around the yard always came to me, then one day he turned, I tried, but he was just too mean!
    Tracy

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  3. My first visit, and I'll be back for the next report on the hens!

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  4. Thank you guys for your comments and kind words. I'll be sure to keep you updated - since I KNOW the hens will eventually come around.

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