When we started on this bird adventure, our only source of information to start with was the internet which we surfed endlessly, followed by some emails and visits to others that were already doing this........I mean these are living creatures and for sure we want to do everything right for them. So with what we learnt we built them the Chicken Hilton which, we were told if we were to be doing this egg adventure in the winter, would need to be insulated, so we did.
There was lots of information about the lighting shedule required for them to lay eggs, so lights with timers were installed. This being Canada and the temps having the possibility of falling well into the negatives ( well not this year....2012, the year of the non-winter, regardless ) we installed a heat lamp with a thermostat. Of course providing food and water is always a given, and we have adopted the deep litter method for the coop, with a good coop scooping to happen in the spring.
In our mind we provided them with everything a chicken could want ( except a rooster ), and we did the same for the ducks too, including a pond.
So as winter sets in everything is working fine, the ducks have abandoned the run of the Hilton in favour of living either in the pond or underneath the Hilton. The spring is still running madly so water for them is not an issue. The lights and heating in the coop are working fine, eggs are getting laid, and we haven't found a chicken frozen solid yet, so the heat must be working, and we know for a fact that the hydro bill is working just fine.
Not having a rooster has been a problem as the girls are not following the standard information that we recieved about "free run" chickens that they just simply go home at night. This has resulted in the loss of a few birds, in particular Little Lucy, so they are now being locked up much to my dismay and more so theirs.
.......so our only issue so far is that the water still freezes up rock solid overnight and the chickens are thirsty in the morning. We have an automtic waterer for them in the summer which obviously will not work all year. We tried the chicken waterers and surfed again to find all kinds of elaborate ways to make them stop freezing up, all of which would require more wiring and $$$. In the end we chose to go with a dog waterer instead.....the kind that has the one litre pop bottle attached, pop bottles bought for this reason only BTW. Things were still freezing up overnight so we moved it a bit closer to the heat lamp...........which promptly melted the darn bottle. So now instead of just taking a replacement out to them, we have to run back and forth with the one remaining bottle, not really an issue except that someone decided to put the chicken coop downhill.
And then one day all things changed..........we got a rooster!!!
How does a rooster stop water from freezing you ask, well he doesn't, but the "old hand, I've been doing this for years, lets take the simple approach to all of this" farmer that gave us the rooster, also gave us the biggest, most useful, piece of advice yet by simply saying..............
" I just give them a bucket of snow"
REALLY!!!..........it's so stupidly simple that it makes total sense.
It makes you realize that sometimes you can just overthink things
It's so stupidly simple that it makes a person feel like an idiot for not figuring this out themselves........I'm just glad it wasn't one of my kids that came up with this.........then I'd feel really stupid!!!
so this is our new Rooster, Ruckus.
I mentally named him that even before he arrived, because that is what I was expecting from him, but to be honest.............he's really not living up to that, I've barely heard squat from him. But seeing that it's February and we sleep in the basement probably helps, so I'll let you know if I still feel the same way come July with the windows open all night..........and more importantly, the very early AM.
We got him for free from a laid back and experienced farmer that Bob the Builder was working for who had too many. He easily parted with an extra rooster. So easily that by the time I returned the call about whether or not we wanted to do this.......it was already a mute point.............the rooster was already in the box, in the truck.
I didn't really want a rooster, didn't think we needed one, and didn't want to tick off the neighbours any more than the dogs have already done. But with the girls wanting to stay out and party all night leaving us to run around in the dark trying to round them up, and with predators lurking at dusk despite the 2 dogs on the property, and with them seeming to think that I was the rooster, and after losing Little Lucy, which broke my heart......we had to give in and get them a "man of the house".
But seriously, did chicken girls not get the memo from the 70's where we don't need to blindly follow a guy around!!?? Did we really do all that bra burning only for the human species?? Seems so.
So, a week into it, and after a bit of a rough start, Big Ruckus is doing his job.
A few days of him not wanting to come out of the coop, the same coop the girls have been locked up in for weeks since Lucy disappeared, the same coop that the girls tried not to let him in, and the one that he spent a few days sitting under with the ducks ( while his girls ran wild around the property enjoying their freedom again, at last ) he's finally out and about with them and more importantly............he has everyone home long before the dreaded dusk falls.
................last time I looked, he was still sleeping out in the run while the 4 girls are tucked away in the coop, but my real question is........
why are we now getting 5 eggs a day????
