Attack Rooster

Christmas day I was shoveling the snow in the chicken run (the chickens seem to dislike ANY accumulation of snow) and Betty was in the run too, eating chicken poop, when I noticed Fancy Pants (rooster) looking at the dog with his head down. I watched as the rooster suddenly got the nerve to do one of the jobs he was programmed to do - protect the flock. He leaped into the air at Betty and with much wing flapping landed on her back. Betty lowered herself to the ground in submission and the rooster leaped off and Betty headed towards the exit. Once more the rooster made his move and attacked the dog with his feet out and ready to rip. I hollered "hey!" and then called Betty to me. Then I got between the two and shooed the rooster away. After seeing that Betty was uninjured, I proceeded to pick the rooster up and carry him around for 5 minutes. He settled down and didn't fuss so I let him go and he gave Betty no more trouble.

Now that the rooster's got his balls, I will have to watch him at all times so I don't end up with torn pants or worse from his leg spurs. But now I know for sure he will do what he needs to do to protect his girls.

On a different note, the Brahmas are laying fairly regularly so we are up to 4 eggs a day IN THE DEAD OF WINTER! The Red Stars are laying large dark brown eggs and the Brahmas are laying light almost pink eggs that are still fairly small. Pretty sweet considering the lack of supplemental light.
Oh how I long for springtime.

EGGS!!

The first eggs are here. Wednesday December 5th, 2007. I suspected it was CindyLou as she was sitting rather low in the nestbox when I checked on the chickens at 9:30ish that morning. She got up and made some unusual squawks and I thought "This is the day. The Guide said the chicken would be laying low in the nest."
When I got home that night, there it was: small, slightly speckled, brown egg. It was cold and I hoped it wasn't frozen. When I took inside, I gave it the spin test* and it proved to be unfrozen. I took pictures (of course) and then put it into one of the bejeweled cartons Bridget has made for the eggs. Another egg the next day another after work. The third day, I got home around noon and found a very warm egg. Three eggs in three days. I blew out the first eggshell, and cooked it with the other two as basted eggs. Mmm-mmm.
By this time I'm sure it is one of the Red Stars, but just not sure which one - Marjorie Sue

or Cindy Lou

. Saturday I watched the clock, and at 11:30 announced "I'm going out to see if I can watch an egg get laid." Bridget jumped up and we bundled up to face the 15 degree weather. Careful not to slip on the ice that covered everything, we walked to the coop, looked through the window into the hen house and there was Cindy Lou sitting in the left nest. She stood up and there was another small light brown egg. We took turns holding it in our cold hands. It was almost hot.

*The spin test is how you tell a boiled egg from an uncooked egg. You spin the egg on it's side like a propeller, stop it and immediately release it. If it is raw, it will start spinning again due to the centrifugal force of the liquid inside the egg spinning when you stop it and then transfering that motion back to the egg when you let go. Boiled (and frozen) eggs just sit there. Try it!

Ouch!

As usual, this event happened after work one day.
My normal routine is to let the dogs out of their crates and put Jenny Basenji on the zippy leash, then run like hell around the yard with Betty running free. Jenny always sprints to the four or five places where she has scared up a rabbit once - in hopes of flushing one out again. When I say once, I mean once in the past year and a half. She never forgets where the chase took place and goes to at least two of those spots before stopping to pee and then runs to the next. The laughable thing is that when Jenny does actually manage to find a rabbit, she gets so hyper focused on where the rabbit was, that she doesn't see it take off with Betty chasing it on the opposite side of the trees (bush, flower patch, lawn mower, etc.). So then Betty gives a half-assed chase before I call her back with a "leave it" and she comes back to see what Jenny is so worked up about.

This time we were rounding the garage to the chicken coop area and I did not see that Blackie O. was out. Before I knew it, Jenny had grabbed her by the upper wing! There was much squawking and Jenny bite down on my thumb as she lunged to grab the chicken after I freed it. I managed to get Blackie O. back over the fence without too much fuss and she has since been out nearly every day, so there must not have been any serious injury. As for my thumb, there was a red spot under the nail for a few days - no serious injury.
One day, my wife said she came out to see that crazy chicken walking towards Jenny who was tied out. I personally doubt she would have actually gotten close enough to be eaten, but Bridget is not convinced we won't be less one chicken if we don't clip some wings.