Silkies R Us

So after a few weeks of mike moping around following the loss of little Stuffy, we recently welcomed our newest batch of Silkies to our basement brooder (first picture).... Let us introduce you to, in no particular order and names subject to change: Veda, Yeti, Corky, Cinder, and Rupal. These are special Silkies as they are rare colors, we have one blue one who is really more charcoal grey(Cinder) and 4 lavenders. An area breeder advertised them because they all have some imperfections so are not show quality -- 4 only have 4 toes instead of 5 and one has a crooked face (see second photo). They are 7 weeks old and super super cute. They are straight run meaning they could be either boys or girls but we suspect that Cinder, Veda, & Corky are all girls and Yeti and Rupal are boys... they are super soft and cuddly and very cool so we are excited to welcome them to our family. The boys will have to go but we think we will keep all three girls. We just may add a few others to the mix later next week so stay tuned.

LuLu LuLu the Lunatic...

So our little baby, our runt of the litter, our sweet little lulu the Polish wonder chicken is causing a big disruption to our chicken harmony. Chicken harmony is our term for peace and good will amongst those in our flock. Harmony means there is still a little pecking here and there but for the most part, all chickens know and accept their place in line - aka the pecking order. Well, little lulu has become quite the hardass and is throwing the flock in a tizzy. The pecking order was recently (well until Lulu struck) like this: Gladys - Eleanore - Gerdie - Maybel - (Tillah) - Razzle -(Stuffy) - Penny - Lulu. Lulu clearly was in the rear and we worried that she would always be severely hen pecked. We had some changes as we had to re-home Tillah and sadly Stuffy passed away on us (see previous post) and Razzle has been broody for a few weeks and these changes through things off a bit. Well Gerdie and Gladys started to befriend Lulu and within a few weeks, we have mayhem. To put it simply, Lulu now beats on Gladys our all powerful leader so we thought. For good measure she beats on Gerdie as well. So our new circular order is something like this: Gladys - Eleanore - Gerdie - Maybel - Razzle - Penny - Lulu - Gladys - Eleanore - Gerdie and so on and so on. So we call Eleanore the beast because she is the number 2 chicken in order and is the muscle to the Gladys regime and she can be vicious when she needs to be. Well sweet little Lulu is now starting to back down the beast which is simply amazing. So if Lulu beats down Eleanore then its quite possible that tiny little Razzle, our smallest chicken, might be running the show because she, along with Penny are the only 2 that do not back down to lulu and actually put the beat down on her ... summary is we do not have chicken harmony and it doesn't look like its coming anytime soon... so we may as well get more chics to add???? see next post.

Good bye Sweet Stuffy

With heavy heart we say goodbye to our sweet white Silkie, Stuffy. Stuffy was a little over one year old and died suddenly on March 25, 2011. She was a special little girl and will be deeply missed not only by her humans, but by her sister and broody-mate, Razzle as the 2 were inseparable. In the beginning when Stuffy was just a little chic, she and Nicole bonded right away. Stuffy would spend hours in nicoles hands and would take mock dust baths in her hands. When she got older and moved outside, she would sit in Nicoles hands and duck her head underneath her arms and sleep and preen away. She was a personable little girl who brought big smiles to us both. She was the first of the 'littles' to lay and would go broody all the time. Along with Razzle, she spent many days with me when i would get restless and was one of the great joys of my day. Stuffy loved to have her chest rubbed right underneath her right wing - it was wierd but she loved it. Stuffy was a wonderful pet and friend and her spirit will always live on in the Modees Farm.

Goodbye my sweet friend.