The day we had to bring the goats to Country Dream Farm was a sad one. I felt like I had let those three furry girls down because I could not safely care for them. Seeing my pouty face the next morning, my husband asked if it was finally time to get some chickens. I’ve been wanting my own little flock for some time, but could not rationalize adding another bunch of animals when my goats were continually eating the neighbor’s tree or chasing down joggers. “No,” I said. “It just wouldn’t be fair to the goats, it’s too soon.”
Around 4pm that afternoon, we were all in the truck heading to Runnings to get some chicks (I’m sorry, I couldn’t help myself!). We brought home six adorable little chickens, setting them up in the barn with a heat lamp in an old metal tub we had found in the woods a couple years back. We loved them but everyone we talked to said that they die pretty easily. So… the next weekend, we went and got 12 more little girls, just in case. We did try to get them from Duprey’s Feed locally but it turns out they had been sold out for weeks. Apparently, everyone wanted chickens since they were home socially distancing.
We ordered the girls a beautiful coop and built them a sweet little run based on a set up I saw on Pinterest. I was delighted to see how easy they are to care for; I even started leaving their little coop door open at night since the walls for their run were 7 feet high. Yup, you know where this is going… one sunny morning I skipped out across the yard to greet my little chickens good morning and found brutally murdered little chicken bodies all around. It was a massacre with five chickens dead and another four totally missing. I don’t mean to be dramatic or gross in my description but it was horrible! Amazingly, there were eight girls left. Somehow, they’d survived and certainly didn’t seem nearly as traumatized as I was. A few nights later, Bill and the boys put a roof on the chicken run and you can be assured that I now lock those chickens up tight in their coop every night.
Prior to the horrific incident, I was worried that maybe we had gotten too many chicks. After all, outside of the massacre, only one little chick had passed away. But, when we ordered our coop, we picked one that would comfortably house at least 15. With only eight left, wouldn’t they get cold in the winter with less body heat?
You know what happened next – we went back to Runnings and picked up another eight chickens to add to our hen house. They’re so adorable. We now have 16 chickens and there are five’ish different types. The ‘ish is because one is supposed to be a Rhode Island Red but she sure doesn’t look it so she’s the ‘ish. They bring me that same joy of cuteness overload that the goats used to and, hopefully someday, they’ll even give me eggs!
In this story, I’m thankful to Bill and the boys for encouraging me to get chickens and build the chicken run … with a roof. A shout out to Boone and Rachael for coming to help build the run as well. I’m also thankful to Rafferty Sand & Gravel for the truckload of sand that was delivered just in time for us to put our chicken coop in its place. Pretty soon, I’ll be thankful to the chickens for my breakfast.
