Eggucation

Much can be observed if one watches chickens. First there were two, we call them the "old ladies;" then there were four babies, then there were two babies, then there were four adults all together. The Old Ladies and the Young Ladies. Of the old, there's Crooked Foot and Straight Toes. Of The young there's Starry and Night. Night is quite friendly, an iridescent black with emerald shine, beautiful. Starry is speckled black and white. Old Crooked Foot was the Boss Chicken, getting her pick of the food and eating first, but when Night grew up, they got in a big fight. Crooked foot emerged one day like a phoenix on it's last legs right before the flames. All disheveled and featherless, very beat up looking. After that I realized Night was the new boss. Poor Starry is at the bottom of the pecking order.

When I was the designated feeder, Nighty would stand right in my path and not move if I shook my foot. She would rustle her feathers and kind of squat down right in front of me. A few times of that, I realized, she wants to be petted. I pet her and she really loves it. Then I started picking her up and petting her. So cute. I never knew how deep their feathers are and how soft. Since Aji returned from Nepal and took over the feeding, Nighty hasn't let me touch her. Fickle.

I used to like the ravens around here because they remind me of Edgar, but now I hate them. One day, a raven attacked Nighty! She was so scared as it swooped down again and again to peck at her. Nighty stuck her head into a hole in the ground and the raven pecked and pecked. Aji saw this happening and ran outside to scare the raven away. She picked up Nighty and brought her in the house to show me the large gaping wound on the chicken's back. I put my silver gel stuff on it, which continuously kills germs for five hours, and put her in the coop. I kept putting it on for a few days, and she made a full recovery. 

I asked my neighbors if I could order some adult laying chickens from them. (Cal Ranch has a large sign outside saying "great place to pick up chicks," but my chick-raising days are over, I tell you that.) Maybe four more I told them. They said they had 4 right now they could bring over, but it was the middle of winter and I didn't want to put them in the coop together and cause any turf wars. I said, maybe in the spring. Spring came but I was feeling overwhelmed by too many things going on. But they reminded me, do you still want those chickens? I said ok. They brought them over in a dog kennel cage and put them in the coop, they gave us five! I said, how much do you guys charge (I wanted to be a supporting customer of their little farming business). They said, it's our gift, no problem. I said, you gave one too many—egstra. They said it's fine. I told them I wanted to pay but they said those particular five had found their way into the garden and were messing up the crops, and it's almost impossible to keep chickens out once they've found a way in. So I guess I was actually doing them a favor? It was a mutually beneficial eggchange.

All five of the chicken they gave us had no feathers on their backs like they just had a big fight, they were a little scraggly looking. haha. I call them the Back Scratchers. But one of them is such an interesting blonde/gray color with more hair on its' head than the others, I can her Blondie—very creative. So Blondie and the Back Scratchers is my new favorite fake band name. 

Turns out Blondie is an "olive egger." The eggs are mint green color and way too much fun. Egzilerating. This is apparently a result you get when mixing chicken breeds together. There can be pink, blue and green. The others lay beige eggs, and one lays kind of camel colored. The ones we have lay brown and white. The whole Nine of them now make for a very colorful basket everyday from the coop. We can eggspect 8-9 eggs a day, we never need to buy eggs for the foreseeable future. I have learned that if you do not wash the eggs, they don't need to be refrigerated and stay good for a year. But once you wash them they last two weeks and need refrigeration because it removes the "cuticle" a germ-proof barrier they come with. Farm fresh eggs are unparalleled in their nutritional content compared with commercial eggs. Much less cholesterol and so many vitamins. So I feel guilt free incorporating them into my diet. I'm looking forward to making my own bread and cooking up a large batch of french toast. I want to buy a bread maker some day, but I need to find one that doesn't have an aluminum bread pan AND kneading paddles. There is only one that meets that description and it's only available with a European plug type, allegedly to be released in the USA later this year.  

I thought Blondie and the Backscratchers would get in a big war with the Young and Old Ladies. But it seems that they all get along quite nicely. Nighty is definitely the head honcho and gets to eat first and no one dares to mess with her—ironic since she's also the friendliest to people. 

So now I'm really going down the rabbit hole and I want to upgrade the coop, but it's really hard to find a nice one that isn't a million dollars. And I don't know how to build stuff. Most people with a flock of chickens just build stuff. I really want this Amish handmade one...but a million dollars. Ganesh, always practical, asked, how many eggs could we buy with the thousands of dollars spent on a chicken coop? Touché. But I said, in the winter the coop was leaking and snow and water was getting in. Just like last summer when a snake got in the coop. We don't want critters to hurt the chickens or the eggs, and it looks like a shanty town. We need to replace it with something. Beauty is important. We are currently egsploring all the options. 

So all of this has been written from a sleep deprived stupor, Winston recovering from a fever, which has now spread to both grandmas and Ganesh. I apparently am impervious to the viral load, but even more eghausted than usual picking up some of the duties of the sick. Busy busy busy.