Thursday, July 14, 2011

Kiep - getting all grown-up! - Maree

"Dearest chicken, lovely bird,
Love is not too strong a word
For the way I feel for you,
And hope you feel it for me too.
I love you more than I can say,
And even more each passing day!"
- Unknown



Soon all my chickens, including Kiep, my pet hen, will be wanting to lay eggs (they start laying at about 20-24 weeks old, 4-6 months) and Kiep is 25 weeks old now. She is spending more and more of her time with Artemis and only wanders into my Studio at odd occasions now, preferring to roost on the back of the office chair in stead of sitting in the drawer of my desk! Their first eggs will be small and a hen will lay about 20 dozen (240) eggs in the first year and probably no more than 1000 in her lifetime.

So now the hunt is on for nest boxes to put into my two chicken coups, but I've got this feeling that they will prefer to be laying the eggs all around my garden, which their mothers used to do, and I don't really mind, except it's just a bit of security risk as we do have some wild cats and Genets around.

4 comments:

  1. Maree, thank you so much for your chicken story. Much enjoyed it.

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  2. Ah, glad you enjoyed it Studio, and thanks for your lovely comments!

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  3. Oh to have fresh eggs! What are Genets?

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  4. Hopefully soon I will have plenty of fresh eggs PJ! Genets are feliforms, somewhat related to cats. Most of them have spotted coats and long, banded tails, small heads, and large ears. You can Google 'Small spotted Genet' or go to this link to see some photographs : http://www.nigeldennis.com/stock/pages/37.htm

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