Chickens

To all who wish to know:

We were finally able to add 5 hens to our family last August (I know the post is long over due).  After over 8 months of city council meetings and petitioning - out cute little town finally allowed families to have 5 backyard hens.  Both Heidi and Jeff were able to present at a council meeting and written up on the local paper.  We started building our coop last June and finished in August.  Our 2 Road Island Reds and 3 Buff Orpingtons moved right in as 2 month old pullets a dear farmer friend raised from chicks for us when it looked like city council would pass.  

Rules for the coop:  

Odessa - it has to be cute, it has to be strong - I am not cleaning up headless chicken leftovers after a raccoon/skunk/opossum visit 

Jeff - it has to be practical

Here's what we got:

 We added a small green house off the south end.  We had 4 herb plants successfully winter over in there.

On December 6th we got our first eggs:

Our $321.65/egg prizes!

We have been tracking our total cost divided by number of eggs received very closely since we are only on a 2 year trial in the city council's view and we want to show that we truly invested in this chicken endeavor and are definitely not in it for really cheap eggs.  We so far have received around 300 eggs from our little beauties and if we don't buy anymore food or have to turn over any hens in the next 18 months (completely unrealistic) we would need roughly 2,000 more to be at 25 cents an egg - which is still more than the grocery store. Boy are they good eggs.

This spring we started letting our hens out while we are outside working - they are really funny creatures.

If anyone would like more specific details about our coop size or who to get in contact with if you are wanting to petition your local city council for backyard hens please do not hesitate to leave a comment and we will do our best to help.