My friend and chicken mentor Nancy lost her black Jersey Giant rooster this week. An enormous bird, he disappeared off her fenced property without a trace. He was one of those “good roos” and was much loved. Hazel, named for the Watership Down rabbit leader, will now get the chance to take his place, although he will have a Sussex rooster from the same hatching as Finn and Rachel to contend with. With more than 30 hens to share, they will probably be able to work something out! I’m very happy he’ll get to have a good free-ranging life instead of ending up as someone’s dinner.
Clucky, the Orpington on the left has snapped out of her broodiness
Last weekend I (reluctantly) set Clucky on 5 of the eggs I got from my neighbor and placed her in a bucket in the kennel with the two mommy hens and their chicks (the mommies have claimed the nest box area). She settled in and Steve reported that all was well the next morning, but by the time I returned from work Clucky was pacing the kennel hollering to get out. I thought she had broken, so went in to retrieve the eggs and found them smoking hot. So I waited a bit and she went back on the eggs. In the evening, I found Clucky outside pacing again and Flicka setting on the eggs (with the new chicks underneath her her as well), apparently in broody mode again (or still). I didn’t see this coming! So I gave up, released Clucky from the kennel, and pitched the eggs because I didn’t want to have to make a decision right then about where and how to set them. I blocked the nest boxes that night because I’m trying to get the babies to start using the roosts to sleep, and that was apparently the final straw. By the next afternoon, Clucky had rejoined the others, no longer broody. This is a relief for me--I’d like to start whittling the numbers down a bit.
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