A week ago Friday night, we picked up our new little set of layers.
Five birds in all.
Four Buff Orpingtons and one Black Australorp.
All hens of course.
We like the heavy breeds, like you would find on Grandma’s farm. We’ve had Buff’s over the years and enjoy them for their quiet, gentle ways and their willingness to sit on a nest.
They seem to resemble their English origin, with their prim and proper way about the hen house.
One summer, Rustic Russ noticed one of the golden Buffs sitting on an egg she had just laid. Never letting an opportunity go to waste, he quickly gathered up several other eggs that had been laid but abandoned. The hen (who we later named Mother Teresa) didn’t seem to mind the “extras” placed below her ample plumage.
Several chicks were hatched that summer and had a wonderful time exploring about Russ-Stick Acres with their “host” hen, Mother Teresa.
Originally from Australia, the Black Orpingtons morphed into the Black Australorp. They, too, are a heavy breed of farm chicken. Beautiful black, with a greenish tint and cherry-red comb gives them a striking presence in the flock. I was excited to see one lone B.A. when we went to pick up our Buffs. She is fitting in well, although not making herself too available for the camera.
Even though we slowly introduced the new ladies at night, when the flock begins to wind down, we created quite a stir with the new additions.
We should have known. Our small feathered family had their pecking order firmly in place.
As farmers or dog mushers know, any time you add a new dog or horse to your existing group, it alters the order.
Sometimes it is like a ripple, barely noticeable. Sometimes not.
It depends on who you are adding and how they perceive their role in their new surroundings.
We were told by the chicken’s owners that one of the heartiest Buffs was “the Boss”.
Hmmm…I wondered how that would go over.
Well, it became very clear within minutes that our flock intended to cut her off at the pass and let her know this was their gig.
That night, Rustic Russ and I watched for several hours as they all met and got acquainted.
One very happy fella was our resident rooster. Roosters should normally have about 10 chickens to one rooster. He was in his glory seeing the new bevy of young beauties enter his coop. On the other hand, they weren’t as thrilled. They had never been with a rooster before. They would soon learn what that entailed.
By the next day, on Saturday, we had fresh eggs from the new gals, so life is back to normal.
And we have 5 more youngsters to keep us knee-deep in eggs.
Until tomorrow ~ enjoying our flock ~ God willing,
Woodswoman
Oh cute! They are just so cute with their long skinny FEET and beady eyes! Tim wants ducks and chickens so bad. he is vegetarian so he eats a lot of eggs for protein, but he will not buy them from stores or support factory farms in any way. This is our first year living in the country and we are going to build a bird coop together this fall. There is a bird guy who lives down the street who has all kinds of huge, fancy, roosters & chickens and african geese. Maybe you can teach me about keeping them?
Comment by Jennifer ella — July 27, 2009 @ 4:21 am