Four New Babies

There are four new babies at our house, but rather than going all hardcore-attachment-parenting-Dr.-Sears on them as is our usual approach, they are living in our garage:



THE CUTENESS! IT SLAYS ME!



Aren't their butts so adorably fluffy and round?



So yes, after pondering backyard chickens for quite some time (I first mentioned wanting them here on the old blog in 2009) we have finally taken the plunge into chicken ownership. Yesterday we got four little chicks who are now living under a heat lamp in a cage (intended for a rabbit or a ferret) in a cozy corner of our garage. They will live there for 4-6 weeks until they lose their soft fuzzy fluff and grow in their adult feathers, then they will move outside to a coop (which Rob will spend the next 4-6 weeks building). They will reach sexual maturity and start laying eggs by about Thanksgiving or Christmas or so. Eggs from our very own chickens!



We picked breeds that have good egg production and are well-suited to cold weather; we got one each of four different breeds:

• a Buff Orpington, the pale golden chick, who is named Henny Penny and will look like this when she grows up. She seems the most low-key and amiable of the four.
• a Barred Plymouth Rock, the mostly black chick, who is named Drumstick and will look like this as an adult. She has the most spunk and initiative of the bunch.
• a Speckled Sussex, the dark brown chick, who is named Mrs. Benedict and will look like this when she grows up.
• an Ameraucana, the light brown chick, who is named Ella and will look like one of these when she grows up. The different colored Ameraucanas were all mixed up at the farm supply store so we don't know for sure but I'm guessing she'll be one of the brownish reddish ones. She will lay blue eggs!

Grace has gone out to check on the chicks at least a dozen times in the 24 hours we've had them, and we've both been pooped on already. Violet actually did a decent job of touching and holding them gently, although of course intense supervision is necessary with her. Rob saw an opportunity to tinker with technology so he made a webcam for us to see what the chickens are doing without going out to the garage (the garage door opener scares them anyway). I can't guarantee that the webcam will work permanently but it's been doing pretty good so far, so go visit if you want to see our little chicks running around their new home.