2017 Chickens

This will probably complete the 2017 blog-fest.  Along with my Pink Paradise, dear hubby built a new chicken house and lot.  We have 19 hens, Rhode Island Reds, Golden Comets and Black Sex Links.  They all lay extra large brown eggs.  There is essentially no difference in nutrition of white eggs or brown, but brown eggs just seem more country.  Here is a good article on this subject, and this is another one. 

You can click on a picture for a larger view

New studio and chicken house, all in PINK.

We have a chicken house attached to the barn with a covered lot and THOUGHT it was critter proof, but I can't even remember how many chickens we have lost in the past to possums, raccoons and weasels.

 This one has buried chicken wire at the bottom with 1 by's, the top is covered and stapled to the building.  Every interior opening is sealed with chicken wire and there should be absolutely no way something can get in unless it eats through the wire or we leave the gate or door open.

We did catch a chicken snake in the nest a couple of days ago with a belly full of eggs.  He couldn't get back out through the wire.

It has a loft area for storage.  On one side of the door is a tall 

metal tool cabinet where I keep my pottery stuff, on the other side is a straw bale for nest boxes and a metal garbage can for feed.  

The roosting area is movable and we have heavy duty black plastic underneath.  To clean (which it definitely needs), we just move the roost out of the way and roll up the plastic with the poop and take to the compost pile.  The roost needs a bar replaced, hubby will have to get that done.  

The nesting boxes.  The hens keep raking the bedding out and it's a mess.  We have no rooster, but 2 hens have gone broody.  We got some fertilized eggs from a man at church and put under them, but they keep switching nests!! We marked the fertile eggs and have to keep putting the hens back on their boxes or putting their eggs back under them.  

The black sex links and golden comets are molting and look rather pitiful, but are still laying steadily.