It's been a long while since I posted, and we moved to a different city in the meantime. We suffered a terrible loss when Gypsy was eaten by the foxes' kits at the end of the Summer, and we found another home for her chicks, including the Olive Eggers we were so excited about. It felt like a major setback. I immediately placed more with a luckily-timed broody, which hatched 2 weeks before our move, and put eggs under another broody, Juliet (an FCBM hen), a few days later, set to hatch 5 days after our move. She would be our fourth hatch of the year, and our third broody--two French Coppered Black Marans, and one Black Java.
Moving 30-ish chickens, including a mother with 2 week old chicks and a broody hen on eggs is no easy task. We loaded the two coops, chickens inside, on this trailer, which took the better part of a morning and three adults doing heavy lifting/engineering. We had an additional couple of pet carriers/broody boxes that were transported, with chickens inside, and I was delighted to find this when we got the birds out at the new place. One of my two elderly Brown Leghorns, which as far as I am concerned are a breed as akin to an egg-laying machine as one can get, laid this egg on the way, in this box, on a trailer, with 5 other hens and a rooster beside her. It seemed a good omen--everything is going to come out ok. ;)Sure enough, the new place was amazing for the birds. Lots of lush green grass, even in the heat wave, and new leaves and humus to hunt bugs in. Minerva, seen here with her five hatchlings, felt right at home.
And that brings us up to speed. I relaxed on the porch a lot of mornings and drank coffee watching my flock thrive here, and waited as patiently as I could for the day my ONE surviving Olive Egger, Ophelia, would lay her first egg.
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