Happy Birthday Pullets!

Pullets Really Fly the Coop!
by Sharon Gaughan, PCLF Education Program Director

Our pullets hatched as baby chicks on June 23^rd – today is September 23^rd.  Happy 3-month birthday to our new flock!  
 

In celebration today, the pullets have been allowed full access to the entire chicken yard for their first time! 

We’ve been opening the pop doors (the two small chicken-sized doors) every day now for nearly 3 weeks, and allowing the pullets time outdoors in a small area immediately outside the pop doors.  When we open the pop doors now, there is no hesitation to go outside – in fact, there’s usually a bit of pushing and shoving as several try to squeeze through the small doors at once. 

There’s never a time when 100% of our 100 pullets are outside – so it’s impossible to tell whether each individual pullet comes out at some point, or whether there are some that feel more secure staying “cooped up” inside.  Either way, we decided it was time to expand their world even further – for the sake of those that were ready.

This morning, Anya and I opened the temporary gate which we had set up to keep them in the smaller enclosure, then stepped back to watch and photograph as a few – and then more – ventured out to explore.  They were tentative, but not nearly as tentative as they were that first day the pop doors were open.
 

Those that did venture out, almost immediately starting scratching for insects and/or sampling some of the green things growing in the chicken yard (weeds and mulberry leaves mostly).  A few also found a good spot to dust bathe. 

 

No doubt they were thinking, “Wow!  Life just keeps getting better, here on the farm!”

 

At Night in the Hen House

Pullets Perching in the Dark

by Sharon Gaughan, PCLF Education Program Director

In case you've been wondering, the pullets have adjusted well to their brooder box being removed. 

 

Here’s a photo that Anya took with her phone a few nights ago, of the pullets on the adult roosts.

 

10 Weeks and Counting!

Chicks Grow Into Pullets –

and (Sort of) Fly the Coop!

by Sharon Gaughan, PCLF Education Program Director

Our chicks are really not chicks anymore.  At 10 weeks of age, they look like chickens now – albeit small versions of the full-grown hens they will someday be.  I need to get into the habit of calling them “pullets” (defined as female chickens under the age of one year) rather than “chicks” – but old habits die hard.  Besides, I always liked the alliteration of going out to the hen house to do a “chick check.”  Somehow, doing a “pullet check” doesn’t sound quite as appealing.

Last Friday afternoon, we opened the pop doors (the two small chicken-sized doors) to the chicken yard for the first time.  Not yet ready to give the chicks (oops! I mean, the pullets!) full freedom of the entire chicken yard, we fenced off the small area just outside the pop doors – then Anya sat inside with one of my cameras, and I sat outside with the other.  We wanted to document their first steps to the outside world. 

We waited, and we waited, and we waited.  The chicks… the pullets were very interested in the outside world – but they weren’t all that anxious to set out into it.  It was nearly an hour before a few of them finally decided to cross the threshold.  Unfortunately, they had only a couple of hours to explore before the early Friday evening storm hit – and then began the 3-day Labor Day weekend. 

Anya and I shared “pullet check” responsibilities, as usual, over the holiday weekend – but we didn’t open the pop doors to the yard again until the following Tuesday workday, when we would be around throughout the day to check on them regularly.  Helped, in part, by some tempting Swiss chard greens strategically placed outside the doors, more of the pullets chose to come outside on Tuesday, and much more quickly than they did last Friday.  At one point, I counted as many as twenty-two brave pullets in the outside yard.  My guess is that number will continue to rise each day.

We also decided to start giving the pullets some of their "grower feed" in the adult feeders that are built into the walls of the hen house just below the nest  boxes.  I was a bit worried that they might not yet be tall enough to reach into these adult feeders, the height of which is not adjustable.  But they seem to be doing just fine!       

At night, increasing numbers of chicks->pullets are now perching on the adult roosts for the night (71 of them last night, by Anya’s count!).  Most of the rest have been roosting on top of the brooder box (vs. lying on the wood shavings below the brooder box, as they did during their downy chick days). 

We stopped turning the brooder box light on at night about a week ago – between the warm weather and the fact that the pullets are now fully feathered, we decided that it was probably well past time to do that.  And so today, Anya and I made another big change in the lives of these growing birds, and removed the brooder box from the hen house entirely. 

It will be interesting to see how many pullets will be perching on the adult roosts tonight!

Fall After-School Farm Camps

Spend Time With Our Chickens --
in Our Fall After-School Farm Camps!

by Sharon Gaughan, PCLF Education Program Director

 

Summer 2013 is already coming to a close, and Fall is just around the corner! 

This post is just a quick reminder about our two fall after-school camps.  There are still spots available in each of these camps – so please visit our website soon to register!
 

Great Garden Gang: Exploring Fall!

Help us harvest from our farm fields and children’s garden, and our chicken flock – and then use our harvest for cooking and crafts!
Ages:  6-10 years
Days:  Thursdays
Dates:  September 12, 19, 26, October 3, 10, 17
Time:  4:00-5:30 p.m.
Cost:  $95

 
Be Part of the Chicken Chore Crew!
If you’ve been a Hen House Helper volunteer with your parents, or if you’ve been part of our farm camps or other farm programs, then you’ve already had the incredible experience of collecting eggs from our chickens.  But there’s much more involved in caring for our flock than collecting eggs.  Come join our Learning Farm chicken farmers to learn about and participate in some of these important tasks!
Ages:  8-12 years old
Days:  Mondays
Fall Session Dates:  Sept. 9, 16, 23, 30
Time for Fall Session:  4:00-5:30 p.m.
Cost:  $25/child/session

Workshop Opportunities!

Suburban Homesteading Workshop Series:

Including a Backyard Chicken Workshop!
by Sharon Gaughan, PCLF Education Program Director

The urban and suburban homesteading movement has gained momentum in recent years.  Increasing numbers of urban and suburban folks are striving toward a more self-sufficient and sustainable lifestyle – growing more of their own food (and in some cases their own small livestock, such as chickens and bees), as well as preparing more of their food, fiber, and other items from scratch. 

Greater numbers of suburban homesteaders are practicing small-scale farming in their suburban-sized backyards – and sometimes in their front yards, as well.

 

Our Learning Farm staff share a love of this homesteading lifestyle.  We live in the suburbs and we work on a suburban farm – we practice suburban homesteading both on the farm, in our own homes, and in our yards every day in a variety of ways.  We each have our areas of interest and expertise – and taken together the Learning Farm staff holds a wealth of knowledge and experience for the suburban homesteader.  Through these workshops, we can share our passion with those seeking a similar lifestyle.

The idea to start this fall Suburban Homesteading Workshop Series came to me while attending a presentation on backyard chickens earlier this year.  As a farm set in the suburbs, Prairie Crossing Learning Farm is uniquely positioned to serve as a resource for new suburban homesteaders – those looking to explore new homesteading topics or to further hone their existing skills.  My hope is that we will be able offer a new set of workshops each season throughout the year, moving the Learning Farm toward becoming a center for suburban homesteading.

Here are the workshops that we’ll be offering this fall (note that the first workshop date is this Saturday!):

 

·         Preserving the Harvest -> August 24

·         World Grains – Growing & Using -> September 14

·         Small-scale Composting -> October 5

·         Backyard Chickens -> October 26

·         Homemade Yogurt & Granola -> November 16

 

Visit our website for more information and to register! 

 

 

Reflections...

Reflections on Farming – and by Extension,

Reflections on Raising Our Chicks
by Sharon Gaughan, PCLF Education Program Director

I recently purchased and happily read three new memoir-type books on farming – and in each I found a quote that put me in mind of our experience raising our new flock of chicks during the past 7 weeks. 

Some of my thoughts and feelings are reflected in the quotes from these authors…

“A farm is a manipulative creature.  There is no such thing as finished.  Work comes in a stream and has no end.  There are only the things that must be done now and things that can be done later.  The threat the farm has got on you, the one that keeps you running from can until can’t is this: do it now, or some living thing will wilt or suffer or die.  It’s blackmail, really.”

Kristin Kimball (The Dirty Life: A Memoir of Farming, Food, and Love, p. 150)

“Farming is a beautiful thing, but it takes a lot out of you.  It’s not so much the actual labor but rather the relentless responsibilities that do it.”

Jenna Woginrich (Barnheart:The Incurable Longing for a Farm of One’s Own, p. 148)

“At last the chicks arrived…  From that day forward…  Up at four – start the kitchen fire – put the coffee on – go out to the baby chicks – come back and slice off some ham and sling it into the frying pan – out to the baby chicks with warm water – put toast into the oven – out to the baby chicks with mash – set the breakfast table – out to the baby chicks with chick food – open a can of fruit – out to the baby chicks, and on and on through the day.  I felt as if I were…fleeing down the track in front of an onrushing locomotive.”

Betty MacDonald (The Egg & I, pp. 107-108)

Now, not wanting these quotes to leave you with the wrong impression, let me end this post by saying that raising these chicks (from 1-day old to their current 7 weeks of age) has been one of the most rewarding things I’ve done yet as an employee of the Learning Farm. 

Some of life’s best experiences require a bit of effort on our part...

Photo Evidence 

that the Chicks are Growing Up!

by Sharon Gaughan, PCLF Education Program Director

Our chicks are 6 weeks old now – and they continue to grow and explore their world.  This past week they reach several small milestones (maybe those are called “quarter-of-a-mile stones”?), as well as one rather large milestone.  

Here are some of the small ones:

Practice perching on the adult roosts during the day…

Drinking from the new adult waterer…

Exploring the adult nest boxes…

Exploring the outdoors through the open door (they haven’t yet been let outdoors)…

As for the rather large milestone? 

Well, I’m still coming in to check on the chicks late at night (not quite as late as I was before, but I still don’t feel comfortable letting them go for a full eight hours without someone peeking in on them).  On Tuesday night I came in to find four of the chicks sleeping on the adult roosts for the first time, rather than sleeping near or under the brooder box!  While we’ve seen them perched on the roosts during the day, this was the first time any of them had chosen to sleep there for the night.  I was excited, and noted this new development on our “Chick Check Log.”

The next night, Wednesday, I found four chicks on the roosts once again.  It might have been the same four – but there’s no way to be certain, of course.

But then along came Thursday, and when Anya closed the chick house up for the night at 8:30 p.m., she texted me saying that there were 32 chicks roosting on “the big girl perches”!  

When I came in for my late night chick check a few hours later, 18 chicks remained perched on the roosts – the others had returned to the warmth and security of the brooder box.  

Every night since then, I’ve found 17 or 18 chicks sleeping on the adult roosts during the late night check – a definite sign that our girls are growing up!

This Week with the Chicks

This Week –

Several Milestones for the Chicks, 

and another Chicken Farm Camp!

by Sharon Gaughan, PCLF Education Program Director

The chicks continue to grow and develop way too quickly!  By last weekend – at 4 weeks old – several of the more precocious of the flock were repeatedly flying up and perching on the “chick corral.”  If several chicks chose to do this at the same time, the corral would collapse.  That would result in chicks running about outside of the corral and onto the bare cement coop floor, as well as around and through the supplies we still had stored inside the coop for our ease of access. 

Like a mother not wanting to send their child off to kindergarten, I still didn’t feel that the chicks were ready for access to the entire coop – but clearly the chicks felt otherwise.  So on Tuesday afternoon, I bought several more bales of wood shavings – and on Tuesday early evening, Anya and I spread the wood shavings, took the chick corral down, and gave the chicks the run of the full coop.

They are quite enjoying their expanded world!  Some of the chicks almost immediately started perching on the “window sills” and on the adult roosts (but only during the daytime; at night they all still return to the heat and security of the wooden brooder and its heat lamps).

This past week we also held our chicken farm camp for 7-10 year-olds.  With the chick corral removed, the campers were able to enter the coop (in small groups), find a place to sit in the wood shavings, and feed the chicks greens and/or mealworms.  That was a hit with both the campers and the chicks.

The chicks seemed to enjoy the food and the attention – as well as the additional objects upon which to climb!

As I type this, the chicks are 5 weeks old today – and today we started mixing their “chick starter” feed with new “chick grower” feed.  We’ll transition fully to “grower” feed during the next few days. They’ll continue to be fed “grower” feed until they start to lay eggs (at 5 or 6 months of age) – at which time we transition to “layer feed.”  

Our chicks are still chicks, but they won’t be chicks for much longer!