The Chicken Saga

If you have been reading this blog pretty regularly, you will remember that we have pet chickens, right? We still do, but it has been a long, hard, road. You will also remember that the racoons ate our two ducks previous to the chickens, right?

Well the raccoons struck again!

Last week, on Gabriela's first day of school, I went out to get my stroller from the garage for when we were going to walk Gabriela to school, and found that there was only one baby chick in the cage. I freaked out and then went out into the backyard and they were gone. Five out of six of our baby chicks had been eaten again. I sat on the back steps and cried. I found feathers from a few of the birds in clumps in the grass and knew our babies were gone. I think they flew out of the cage and made there way outside in the night. When I told Gabriela when she woke up, she started crying and then I cried some more. It was so sad people. The smallest of our chicks, named Squirt, was left and kept yelling from the box because chicken hate being by themselves.

Gabriela insisted she wanted another one just like Sassy, so I went to work on the computer to find us some more. I also had to run over to my sister in law's to borrow one of her birds to keep Squirt company. We took another trip back to SLC to get three more chickens the next day. I now know that each bird has his or her own personality. These birds are a lot more docile than our previous birdies.

Things were going great, but our little flock was not complete. We only had four and we are allowed up to six in the city. It's better if they all grow up together to help them get along better, so two days ago, I found a guy selling some here in town. We went and picked up two from him and decided to get some lunch and eat it at the park. Our other chickens are really good about not running off when we put them outside. It's easy to keep and eye on them and not to bad to catch. That being said, we thought it would be a good idea to let the little chickens play in the grass while we ate our lunch.

WRONG...BAD IDEA!!! One of those chickens must have been part road runner, because he took off like a bat out of (well, you know where) and would runner underneath about ten rows of picnic tables going the opposite direction you are. I looked like an idiot out there chasing this bird and long story short, he ran up into the woods, behind a chain linked fence, never to be seen again.

He didn't even make to our house! So lets do the math. I've purchased eleven birds and I only have five. Can we say that I'm definately an amateur farmer. Good grief.

On a more happier note, we got the chicken coop finished and the birds are sleeping outside now. Wahoo!!! Pictures soon to follow.

So stay tuned, I'm sure the chicken saga is far from over.