Nothing says Spring like chicks!
We got the call from the Post Office at 6 am the other day and Mr. Fix-It rolled out to pick up our little box of peeps.
Normally I enjoy hustling the kids out the door 40 minutes early so that we can ride to pick them up before I drop them off at school. But we’ve been letting them sleep in a bit lately since everyone’s been sick on and off and on and off again already this year. So Mr. Fix-It had the honor of bringing them home while we were having breakfast.
So we left them in their box, in our master bathtub, until I came home at lunchtime.
(What? You’ve never come home to peeps in your bathtub? You don’t know what you’re missing!)
Usually I pick them up, drop the kids at school, and then “sneak” the box into my office for a few hours until I can take them home at lunch. Then I put fresh food and water in their brooder house and take them out of their shipping box one by one. I dip their little beaks in the water and make sure they’re each drinking. After a drink or two, they really perk up and start shuffling around and find the food pretty fast.
These are all egg laying hens to replace our losses from last year in the henhouse. Between our predator problem and Hurricane Irene, we lost more than half our flock last fall!
This time we’re trying a couple new heritage breeds, New Hampshire Reds and Black Australorps to go along with our Lakenvelder and Buff Orpington hens from the last couple years. We’re not breeding our own chicks right now because I don’t have the time (or patience!) to be raising roosters at this point. There are a lot of hatcheries that supply heritage breed chicks though, so it hasn’t been a problem.
Hopefully this year goes better!
