We are doing some renovations upstairs of our new house where there's a good view of my chicken coop. The construction crew tells me they've seem a big red tailed hawk fly down and perch on my chicken coop a couple of times.
Of all places! Can't he perch on some bird feeder or a random small tree?!! He might as well put in his order for a chicken lunch!
The red tails out here are BIG! I've been impressed. They must be better fed than the ones in more urban Belmont. Stronger and better fed.... and able to carry off large chickens for lunch....
Usually, I let me hens run free an hour or so in the afternoon sun. After this conversation with the construction guys, I only let them out briefly today when I could watch them carefully. The problem was, it was such a nice day and the girls really wanted to run for a while. After 20 min, I started trying to get them back into their coop and it took me a good 20 min. They did NOT want to go.
So, the eggs in the picture above are what the hens lay in about 5 days now. Since all 3 hens are laying, finally, I usually get 6 brown eggs per week from Penny (Black Australorp), 5 blue/green eggs per week from Ginger (Auracana), and 3 giant pink eggs a week from Bertha (Light Brahma). Bertha has just started to lay. So that's 14 egg a week. Plenty for us, and we're giving some away to anyone who leaves a car with open windows on the driveway ;-) Tomorrow I'm planning to make mushroom quiche, and then, Friday for guests, I'll make some deviled eggs of all different sizes.
We have Cooper's Hawks and Redtails at the Jersey Shore. I always let my 3 hens out around 2 in the afternoon for some free ranging time. When it gets dark, they go back into their house all by themselves. The hawks aren't interested in hens. However, I did see one grab one of my koi fish yesterday. All the fish are now hiding at the bottom of the pond but are so big and brightly colored that they are simply sushi to the hawks.
ReplyDeletePut Skippy on the job! He should keep all the bad guys away.
ReplyDeleteA friend of mine had a red tailed hawk drag off a full grown chicken off last fall. Our red tails are pretty big up here. Everyone protects their hens from the hawks here. I'm planning to build a light weight, movable chicken wire run for them to get some extra foraging time this summer.
ReplyDeleteYeah, be careful! We only lost one chicken to a hawk but she was a standard size hen.
ReplyDeleteDid you heat the chicken coop in the winter?
ReplyDeleteI had a ceramic bulb in the coop and turned it on when temps went below about 15 or 20*F. It was a really cold winter here.
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