1/16/2004: Baby elephant mud bath

[Griff]

I really like chickens. They are soothing to watch and listen to. I think its good for the kids to be familiar with the compressed life cycle of chickens since they can extrapolate a lot more information from watching them than you'd expect. They can be tough on a yard, we've had them here from the time we first established our "lawn" so they are constantly tearing up weaker sections.

The only trouble with meaness that we've had is when roosters get close to three years old. If you don't interact with the roosters at all they seem to behave well for about 2 1/2 years. The hens of most breeds like to be held and petted. We have dominiques which are great foragers and smart about hawks something thats important since we let them range free during the day. Domi roosters are gorgeous critters. We also have aracunas which lay oddly colored eggs like blues and greens. They are a much more nervous breed but come in all kinds of crazy colors. Our lakenvelder chickens, I'd call a failure since the roosters are noisy and the hens are skinny and skittish. The Rhode Island Reds are good layers and pretty smart birds. We've had a few others with varying results.

There are a number of bantam breeds which make nice pets. I've never kept a single chicken so I don't know how they respond to isolation. They seem to enjoy flocking up and the hens seem more content with a couple roosters in the flock.