The Chooks have arrived!
So after much anticipation and a great deal of self restraint we went ahead and got chickens in the last few weeks. We decided that buying them in March made the most sense as the chooks lay more eggs when the days are longer and less in the winter. We also felt it would be nice to welcome them to our smallholding when the weather was starting to pick up a bit too.
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We made a trip to the local market in St Yrieix la Perche and bought two Sussex, two Rouge and two Noire, so have six in total, all named after female friends of ours.
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The chooks were described as '5 mois', so 5 months old and they generally start to lay from 6 months of age. It took 3 or 4 weeks but the eggs have started to arrive and the childlike excitement of discovering their first egg was priceless. There seems to be only one laying so far as we are getting one per day but a few of the other chickens are now doing a strange squatting action when you go into the coop. This is apparently them preparing for the male bird to jump on board and fertilise their eggs so this behaviour is hopefully an indication more eggs will start to follow.
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I am sure everyone says this but the colour, texture and taste of your own fresh eggs is worlds away from the insipid pale yellow yolked runny things on offer from supermarkets.
The chicken we called Sarah is definitely not sharing her lizard!
