Bad To The Wishbone

We've kept chickens for many years, now.

And through the years we've had many breeds of chickens.

It wasn't until this year, however, that we had funky chickens.

Yes, we have five funky chickens right now...

five Silver Spangled Hamburgs...

five hellions.

I call them The Dots... that is, Dorothy Hamburg and her four sisters... quintuplets.

I thought, when I placed my order for chicks, that I would get the usual

brown layer package that I always order.

(Well ordered, pleasant, rule-following hens...you know the kind.)

I must have had a small stroke as I placed the order...

and ordered something completely different...

because what I got is the craziest,

rag-tag bunch of chickens that you could ever ask for.

This group doesn't believe in rules.

No boundaries... no curfews... no rules.

When we first moved this new group of young hens into the large

chicken yard (which is flanked by two large houses)...

these crazy Dots decided they were not sleeping in the houses with the others.

Nightly, we would have to shoo them from the branches of the willow tree

that rises above the chicken yard.

And then we would have to chase them down and catch them in order to 

get them safely tucked inside their houses for the night.
Chicken chasing is not a fun pastime.

This went on for about a week... 

at which point, Hubbs and I gave up.

If the Dots were going to sleep in the tree... so be it.

It's a tall and bushy tree with lots of upper branches...

so we imagined it would be hard for an owl to grab one of the hens perched on a lower branch.

And they were certainly way out of the reach of foxes and coyotes.

Now, however, these five have convinced four other young chickens to join them 

on their nightly curfew protest.

Now we have nine hens roosting above the chicken yard.

I am wondering if it might, in part, be a way to avoid having to sleep 

near these boys...

these crazy rooster boys.

Perhaps... (I can't say that I blame them!)

(Roosters... with their one-track mind!)

Please take heed and let my experience be your guide.

If you ever think you might want to order a few polka dotted chickens,

 because they look really unique...

beware!

These girls will turn your barnyard upside down!

I am thinking that maybe when winter comes and the snow starts to fly,
these girls will re-think their sleeping arrangements.
Time will tell.

Our barn ducks have settled into a daily routine, thankfully.

Each day, these muscovy ducks wander about... usually fairly close to the barn area...

eating bugs.

Meanwhile, the five runner ducks spend their days wandering as far from the barn as possible...

and muddying everyone's water buckets on their way!

Here they are heading up towards Dr. Becky's house.

Thankfully, everyone heads back down to their own yard by bedtime...

at which point, I tuck them into their own house for the night.

Oh, how happy I am that I don't have to chase them back to their house each night!

One thing that I forgot to share with you about our time in Africa...

was the traffic jams...

JUST LIKE HOME!!!

African guineas have lovely bright aqua heads compared to ours...

but their vehicle-sense is equally bad!