hello ladies

Amy here… making my first foray into blog territory… I thought it appropriate to make my first post about my number one goal for the farm… something which i have held memories of close to my heart for many years, without the space or permission available to me to re-create them until now… chickens!!!!!!!!

When i was younger and living at Murrindindi i was keeper of the chooks, tending to their every need from food scraps, crumble, water, cuddles and egg collection. I visited morning and night and a few more times in between other farm escapades. When i was very little about 4, i regularly ate my lunch sitting in the chookyard. Reaching into my crumpled brown paper bag, i would perch in the doorway to their home and watch them go about their business. Sharing stray bits of crust and the sunny yard with ten or so hens, clucking, scratching and poking about around me.

So it has been a beautiful walk down memory lane, resurrecting the same old chookyard from a little disuse, to introduce it’s newest inhabitants. Four Rhode Island Red X New Hampshire and two Australorp X New Hampshire layer pullets around 12 weeks old. They will start to lay at 20weeks, just in time for Spring.

 

Our new friends are tentative about their new home and will take a couple of weeks to settle in. Like with any house moving experience they are still working out where they put the coffee mugs and how not to bang their heads on that low-lying kitchen cupboard.

For the more serious chook fanciers you’ll see i’ve dusted the ground and perches with lime (white stuff) to cleanse the area of mites and this will make it’s way into the chook’s feathers as they scratch around and dust -bathe in it. This is an easy, organic way to protect against mites.

We’ll have to wait until their personalities fully emerge to name them. Suggestions so far have been: Alan, Graham, Travis Cutler (of Canberra fame) and Peg. I’m holding out for something better.