Just in time for the New Year

This may be January 2, but today feels like the real holiday.   Yesterday was a dud, with no parade on TV and no bowl games.

Today we have all that, plus our first snow of the season (not sticking) and the questionable chicken's first crow.   Right.  Definitely a male.  :(   He began jumping on Dolley and crowing all in the same day.  I had been calling him Francis, since that name could go either way, but there is no question now.  

Fertile eggs are not a problem, I guess, other than the ick factor. I just don't want a bald, traumatized hen that can't get away from him.   All 3 of the girls are in the same coop now, and not liking it much.  Both Dolly and Abigail are pretty dominant, and they are squawking it up to establish a new pecking order (neighbors not home today).  Putting Grace in with Francis when she starts laying would give me purebred bantam Orps, if I wanted to sell fertile eggs for hatching, but she is SO shy, she could handle it even less than Dolley. 

That boy's got to GO!

Re-homing a rooster at any time is very difficult, and at this time of the year.........Besides, he's been inside all this time, and putting him outside at the coldest part of the year seems cruel.   Taking him to the butcher is out of the question.  Sigh..... not sure what I'll do. 

Dec. 11

today (note bigger comb and wattles)

 If you know of anyone who would be at all interested in a PET........he is not at all aggressive, in fact he's a big....well...chicken!  He skitters around at anything he considers alarming, but since I can catch him in the close confines of his coop, I can easily pick him up and hold him.   He doesn't want to admit it, but he likes it.   

As for the girls, Abigail and Dolly have been laying sporadically all season.  I began keeping a light on by the coop when it started getting dark really early.   Abigail molted in the late fall and is still looking pretty ratty, but the new feathers are emerging.   

January means seed catalogs and planning the spring garden.   I saved a good many varieties of seed, and if I buy any, I think I'll buy local.  Sure other seed companies have exciting pictures of new varieties, but will those varieties, grown in a very different part of the country, grow well here?   Ferry-Morse Co. , which I blogged about last spring, is here in KY, has an organic line, and has signed the 'No GMO' pledge.   They can be found everywhere from TSC to Walmart.   I think they will be my go-to source

A day late, but I hope everyone has a happy, healthy New Year.