The New Chicken Run

Now that we're no longer dealing with snow, we've begun work on the exterior of the old chicken coop. The interior got a major overhaul (minus a few details we still need to address) last late fall, which served the chickens well through the long winter. Now we are onto removing all of the exterior OSB siding (and ants, which the chickens eat happily), adding house wrap and all new 30-year exterior plywood siding, painting it and then building a large 12-feet by 24-feet run wrapped entirely in hardware cloth. This will provide the chickens with a run three times the size of their current hoop house run. I've been painting the coop and the run structure in Valspar's 'English Tea Party 6004-2C' and we all absolutely love the way this color looks both sophisticated and gorgeous against all the green. I'm sure it will be just as gorgeous against winter snow.







Also worth noting-yes, we want our chickens and ducks to have as much fresh air, sunshine, bugs, space, and green as possible, but we are not okay with free-range birds. First, there's the busy road and lack of perimeter fencing, and second, we have bald eagles, hawks, owls, raccoons, fox, probably coyote, and any number or poultry predators also roaming our land looking for a tasty meal. We've invested a lot of time and money raising our birds and do our upmost to provide them a good life in exchange for eggs, and we're not about to let them become disposable animals. We feel it's our responsibility to do whatever we can to ensure they get to have long, healthy lives.















On the west side of the run stood an old smoke house that Alex tore down (also infested with ants). All of us have been out there in long sleeves and bug baffler hoods because the black flies are also out and they are vicious. I paint, Alex constructs, Olivia and Adam help applying all the welded wire cloth, and the chickens cluck at us constantly. They are so curious about what we are doing (and they want to know when their next batch of rotten wood and ants will be arriving.) Also, many of them are broody, despite being rooster-less, and they are cranky. Very. Cranky. We're hoping this new run will be a distraction and much needed change of pace for them.




Avis, a Dominique


Doris, a Silver Gray Dorking


Blanche, a Jersey Giant

Oh, and in other news, one of our sweet Buff Orpingtons, who has been a house chicken since early February due to a touch of frostbite that led to the others picking on her, has successfully transitioned back to the flock. Welcome back, Ethel!


Ethel becomes a house chicken


playtime with Alex


settling in


hugs for Ethel

All About Snow

This week was all about snow. Playing in it, preparing for it, experiencing it, and coping with it after. The day before storm Juno, the teens were out on skis, enjoying the brilliant January sun and cerulean sky. Alex put more roofing on the duck pen and wrapped what wasn't covered in poly to keep the ducks safe from the impending blizzard. We called our plow guy. The blizzard brought the wind and 24" of drifts, and with it, cancellations and delays.  The day after, I fed the birds on one of the bare spots created by the dramatic drifting the day before, and we were plowed out twice, and we shoveled paths. The chickens, grumpy about the little bit of snow that managed to blow into their run, refused to go out in it, but pecked at every last bit clumped to our boots. And today, we're back in it again, as a much calmer storm dumps another 10-inches on us. It's beautiful and a wonderland of white out there, just as it should be at the end of January in Maine.

One Little Solstice Tree : Yule : Day Seven

This afternoon, we went into the woods to find our Solstice tree. This is a new tradition, one initiated by Olivia a year ago, and it fits nicely in with our pomander making and Solstice cake eating. It didn't take long before we found a little tree, one too shaded by oaks or growing too close to its siblings, and we said our blessing, cut it and walked back home, where we decorated it with dried orange slices and little snowflakes.

On our walk out of the woods, with the sun behind the hills, we stopped and visited with the ducks and chickens and we told them that winter had arrived. It seems even more Solstice-y now that we have our beloved fowl in the barnyard. (I'm still on the lookout for a duck cookie cutter; we have a chicken.) It makes me think of long-ago people who would have kept their animals close by, preparing for winter, grateful for the returning light, shaping bread into animal shapes, bringing greens inside to remind them, that yes, green would return.

Blessed Solstice from our home (and barnyard) to yours!