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Friday, May 08, 2009
Garden and CHICKIES.
I have been INCREDIBLY LAX with garden posts.
Well, OK, I've been incredibly lax with ALL posts, really, but let's put that aside for the moment.
Anyway. I still don't have pictures of the tomatoes and peppers I'm planting tomorrow, because I am A SLACKER. But I do have SPINACH PICTURES. Yes, that's right, for the second year in a row, something I planted in the ground has actually grown.
Itty bitty carrot tops! Oh yeah, I said spinach.
This year's spinach! Popeye would be proud.
And even more exciting:
Volunteer spinach, sown naturally from seeds that fell from last year's spinach after it bolted, and not discovered by us until we were cleaning out the bed to plant in it in April. This whole nature thing, it really works!
And MOST exciting of ALL... baby chicks!
We're allowed to like them because these particular hens will have long lives of egg-laying; they're not for meat.
One of the chicks (we bought twelve) on the day we bought them, when I THINK they were about two days old but I don't know for sure:
You'll notice that they're reddish and not yellow. That's because they're Rhode Island Reds, see. Not Rhode Island Yellows. (Actually, I think yellow chicks grow up and become white chickens, if it's anything like it is with ducks.)
After a mere week of gorging herself on chick mash:
(full disclosure: I have NO IDEA if that's the same chick. There is virtually NO WAY to tell these girls apart, except that one is kind of small and retiring like a runt.)
A few in one spot: (They had their first outing today; we took them out and put them in the chicken-wire enclosure around the base of our recently-planted apricot tree. SO CUTE to see them scratching and pecking at bugs just like real chickens. Oh. Yeah.
This chick was in the process of being really loud and drawing both Smokey and Scout from the far reaches of our property to gaze ravenously in at her:
She's also, by the way, sitting in one of the FIVE beds we mulched today, in preparation for the aforementioned planting of peppers and tomatoes tomorrow. Is it possible that I might do two blog posts in a row? Don't count on it.
Comments
That does sound adorable, little chicks "acting like" chickens. Even if they *are* chickens.
Your garden updates always make me happy. I'm not sure why, exactly. Just the productivity and the "freshness" and natural *rightness* of gardening, I guess. Makes me wish I would get out and do something similar (but maybe on a smaller scale, to begin with). Maybe one of these days!
Posted by: Michael at May 10, 2009 05:34 AM
Can I just slightly rain on your parade and tell you that if you put them out when they are that size, there is a really good chance they will become crow feed?
Two examples : two of my four my goslings were attacked, killed and eaten by crows.
Second : one of my pals breeds pigs and the crows attacked and killed a piglet. (Well, he killed the piglet because it was so badly mangled by the crows that there was no way it would live)
Posted by: Carol at May 10, 2009 05:47 AM
Carol -- thanks for your concern & wisdom! :) They were under really close supervision. We have a really small circle of chicken wire buried around one of the bareroot trees I planted in our garden -- we let them peck around in there while we sat there and watched. We took a couple of them out for photo ops and put them right back in. :) Then we took them back in the house and proceeded with our gardening. They won't be outside on their own for at least a month or so, and then they're going into a completely covered and enclosed yard and henhouse because we have hawks, raccoons, skunks, cats, dogs, coyotes, and foxes (and crows! although I didn't know crows were a hazard; thank you for letting me know) here just about constantly and they would LOVE to eat our chickens.
Michael: That's how I feel about my garden too. :)
Posted by: Rachel at May 10, 2009 07:41 PM
I totally covet your chickens! There is just something about chickens that is very pleasing.
It must be nice to live where it is pepper and tomato weather! Here in the Pac NW it is only warm enough for radishes, peas, and greens.
Posted by: MamaGeph at May 15, 2009 08:33 PM
BABY CHICKS! So cute!
We were going to get some this year, but my husband was worried that we would end up with The World's Oldest Chickens, thanks to us being saps and all - and overwintering chickens here would be tricky since it's so cold. Sigh.
Posted by: Beck at May 26, 2009 06:25 AM
