Blue beach ball

I subscribe to a local urban farm message group, and the other day someone described her Blue Wyandotte chicken as a "blue beach ball." This amused me to no end, because sometimes little Bob (and her coop-mates, to be fair) does look quite round, especially after she's just fluffed out her feathers.

Here's a nice photo of her from about a month ago. A photo with a backstory. Coco was just entering her broody phase, and was absolutely tormenting poor Bob. Broody chickens are moody chickens (think PMS times infinity), and Coco is Number 3 in the pecking order to Bob's Number 4, so there was nowhere for Coco to peck but down (I sure wouldn't want to go after Miss Buttons, the battleaxe, and you don't want to mess with the blonde chicken!). So out of spite (direct spite towards Coco, indirect toward Buttons and Marmalade for not putting Coco in her place), we plucked Bob from the coop and gave her a special watermelon treat. Oooooo...the other chickens were NOT HAPPY!

"Ohmygod...what is that chicken DOING?!?!? Why is she out there?!? Why are we in here?!?"

Hee, hee, hee!

Cuckoo for Coco

Coco's still broody. Only now she's started shifting nest boxes to sit on the other hen's eggs. I don't know if this is progress over sitting on an empty nest, or not. I've started forcing her to leave the henhouse occasionally, which makes her bitch me out, as you'll see here. It's worse if I also took one of her "babies" from her (aka took an egg from under her).

Marmalade was having NONE of Coco's attitude. She was all, like, "What is your issue?"

She went back into the henhouse a few times while I was sitting with the ladies, but I kept the outer door to the nest boxes open so it was light and bright and not very inviting for nesting, so she turned around and went back out into the coop. 

View from outside the nestbox. Skinny legs, round body. Cracks me up.

In happier times

Here's a Hipstamatic photo of Bob and Marmalade from my recent personal archives. I need to take some new chicken AND garden photos this weekend. Last weekend, I was so busy beating back the inroads the jungle (read: native roses, grapevines and tomato plants) made while we were on vacation (a job made more difficult by having a new-to-us-large dog who was in deep adjustment mode) that I didn't actually take any photos.

Here's a quick Coco update: She's still broody. It's been more than two weeks since we gave up with the dunking and the shutting out of the hen house and just let her sit on that darn, eggless nest. Which means little Bob's been having a nice, terror-free, vacation.

I saw Coco out one afternoon, and my chicken sitter saw her out once while we were gone, so (just as the books say), she has been emerging to eat and drink and poop at least once a day. When she wasn't dead when we got home from vacation, I figured as much.

A few nights ago, we made them all sleep out in the coop (it's really secure, and plenty warm enough this time of year). But when I opened the henhouse door in the morning so the ladies could enter when they needed to lay, Coco pretty much broke all land speed records getting back inside and back on her nest. Jeff keeps threatening the stewpot, but I'm going to let her ride it out. Eventually, she'll figure out that no babies are forthcoming.

Since she's sort of captive (by her own choosing), I've started petting her a lot while I try to gently talk some sense into her. She ruffles her feather a bit, but not much. And it might be my imagination, but I swear her feathers are extra silky and luxurious. Weird.

Coco was a good layer when she was laying, so we've only gotten two eggs each day since we've been back (except one day with no eggs). We may have to start supplementing with some storebought eggs. C'est la vie.