Mad chicken woman....and chicken bore!

One of the biggest delights of last year.....and there have been a few....must be the acquisition of my darling girls.
I have never had chickens before and like most people have always really wanted them. It was one of the reasons for moving to a new house to have a big enough garden to accomodate them.

Our four girls were bought as point of lay from a local market. Primarily wanting the chickens for their eggs I was advised to go for the common garden brown french hen!!! I dont have 2 turtle doves or a partridge in a pear tree...but I do have 4 french hens!!!
My OH and I have  4 children between us gave them task of naming them.. Each were to choose names that were chicken related ...so we have

Yoko
Princess Leah (Layer)
Sunny (as in sunny side up)
Drumstick

Leah was the largest and had the most beautiful dark brown and black colouring... she even laid an egg the first day. What a star! Yoko and Sunny were very similar and colour and it was difficult to tell them apart at first....and they were most certainly top of the pecking order amongst this crowd.
Drunstick....welll ...what can I say....runt of the litter, ugly duckling...you name it. Poor girl was definitely the odd one out. Within days all the chickens except her were laying...their wattles and combs were getting bigger and redder. Drumstick wasnt producing and was starting to look more like a turkey than a chicken.
We then had problems when 2 nights in a row she disappeared. Despite the run being closed, wings clipped and no chance of escape...she was not in the hen house! It was obvious she was being picked on by the others but I couldnt work out how in the evening she was missing from the coop and by morning had miracuously reappeared.
A little spying was necessary .....so as it was getting dusk I laid in hiding to watch what was going to happen. There was Drumstick...despite clipped wing,,,,flying to the  top of the coop and then up to the top of the hedge of next doors garden where she proceeded to sleep for the night!!!
Next day I took action.
1..more wing clipping. I obviously hadnt done  it short enough
2 Keep the biggest bully to one side whilst Drumstick got the feed first

That night when she tried to fly on to the hedge it was a bit of a crash landing back into  the run. She didnt try again.
After a few days the pecking order was reversed and calm prevailed. No problems at all since then.

I am happy to say all the girls are very happy, as we are also, as eggs have been in full  production every day even despite the dark days and early nights. I keep them in the run in the morning until the eggs have been laid and then they are allowed to free range round the garden ( and until we managed to block the holes in the fence they free ranged in all the neighbours gardens too!!!)

 Thia is our very posh chicken house...its called a DOODLE HOUSE. We purchased it second hand...its easy to keep clean and mite free as it comes to bits and can easily be washed down and dried in a couple of hours. Despite having 4 nesting boxes there seems to be a preference for them all to lay in one!!!

BE WARNED!!!!
KEEPING CHICKENS IS NOT COST EFFECTIVE IF YOU ARE BEING SELF SUFFICIENT

Unless you are not looking after them very well.....the cost of the chickens far outweighs any gains that you  make in eggs. Hen house, fencing, bedding, mite powder, feed...treats!!! ( they will come running when they hear the rattle of the sweetcorn tin!)

However the pleasure of keeping the chickens and the guarantee of fresh organic eggs is what makes it all worthwhile.

Please dont start to talking to me about chickens!!!!! It drives the OH crazy and he says I am becoming a chicken bore!!!!