Gary has brought home about 50 free pallets in the past week and he is going back for more! He found an IT company in RTP that had hundreds of free pallets they were trying to get rid of because they just recently got a large shipment of new servers. He is going to use all these pallets to construct the new coop. He plans to make the new one more of a shed style to enclose the chickens more and keep them warmer in the winter, but they will also have an outdoor run to explore.
Last Saturday 7/20/13 we got our very first egg from the chickens! We had the chickens for 3 weeks and Gary was getting worried because they were almost 24 weeks old and he had heard that the chickens can start to lay at 18 weeks. He tried everything, he put golf balls in the nesters, he tried different types of bedding to see what would make them happy, he bought various types of food and special treats that he read would help get the process going and finally we get an egg. On that day Gary & Tayler noticed that Phoenix (one of the Rhode Island Reds) seemed to be protective of the nester and was running all the other chickens off every time they got close. We decided to hang out by the coop to watch what was going on because we thought it was quite funny. I captured this video of Phoenix. She sounds like she's making an announcement. We were not sure if this was her egg song or her way of telling everyone to keep away!
This went on for about an hour and then she settled in a nester and squatted. Gary and Tayler watched her as she squatted up and down and then an egg came out! It was a big one too, I can understand why she made so much noise!
We then took the first egg and compared it to eggs we had in our fridge from Dollar General.
Our fresh egg, the brown egg, ended up having 2 yolks inside which explains why it was so big. To date this first egg has been the biggest so far. You can see that the yolk has an orange color as opposed to the store bought egg with a yellow color. Gary immediately scrambled both of the eggs up separately and we did a taste test. The fresh egg definitely had a better flavor to it.
YUM!
Now 8 days later we have collected 14 eggs! We now have 3 hens that are laying although we are not sure which ones. One of the hens laid a very ob-longed shaped egg, so we can only assume that this was her first one!
You can see the very funny shaped one on the bottom left. So this is what we have so far! Minus the 3 we have eaten of course. Soon once all 4 hens are laying daily we will have more eggs than we know what to do with! We already have so many people that are interested in our eggs so we will have no problem getting rid of them!
Here is the first one that Gary built. He is just getting started on a new one with a different style. We will call this the starter coop, haha. I will post pictures as he builds the new one!
THEN after we had the chickens for about 2 weeks he built a run onto the coop above.
With all the rain we have had around here Gary had to add a way to cover up the main coop to keep the chickens dry. He added tarps on the 4 sides of the main coop area and fixed it so that he can roll them up and secure them with velcro when it is sunny, and he can roll them down and attach them to the coop when it is raining. Some days we leave the tarps down when we leave for work because it might rain and then we come home and the chickens are in the covered coop and not in the run. With these hot days I guess they like the shady coop!
Wow it has been 4 years since I posted here! I used to run 2 blogs regularly but I took a break for a while and now I'm back! We have lots of new and exciting things going on in our life lately so I thought now would be a good time for a comeback! In the past 4 years our daughter Tayler has grow up lots! She will be going into 5th grade next year! Last year in elementary school! Gary and I are still working for Atlantic Prosthetics & Orthotics at UNC Hospitals but lots of changes at work (we won't go into that right now). We are still living in the same house in Mebane next door to my mom. We still have our 2 dogs Sunny & Maya, but we also have some additions to the family.
We have 4 chickens now! We have 2 Rhode Island Reds and 2 Black Orpington's. We named the 2 red chickens Blaze & Phoenix, and the 2 black chickens are Beauty & Sparkles. The chickens just started laying eggs this week so we are very excited! Gary built them a coop from scratch, but he is currently in the process of building a new coop that will work better for the winter. I plan to keep updating the blog as his new coop comes to life!
Tayler has decided that she would like to start her own garden, and Gary is going to help her get started with a planter box, so more details on that to come!
My other project is to get our back yard looking better and more functional, I have a way to go with this one, but we will take baby steps as our budget can afford it.
Tayler loves hanging out with the chickens every night . She feeds them grass & clovers through the fence. 
