Chicken Coup

Remember those cute little chicks we brought home a few weeks ago?

Here they are now, grown quite a bit. They must be teenagers, I believe, if that expression on Albertina's face is anything to go by. If you have raised kids you will know "the look" and will recognize it here right away.

We get nothing but these blank stares from the girls now. They are in a rebellious state and actually staged a coup yesterday. I didn't get the crate quite latched, apparently, and they took full advantage of the situation. When I popped into the guest room (barefoot) for an afternoon visit, I immediately understood that things were not at all right. The cage door was open, the girls had flown the coop, and I was standing in something distinctly unpleasant.

I'm still trying to get the scene in our guest room out of my mind. Perhaps time (and a rug shampooer) will do the trick. How could four little chickens do so much in so short a time, and why, oh why, did they poop so constantly while doing it?

As the girls would say, and you know the tone of voice: Okay, FINE! After a bit of negotiation, we agreed to all their demands (once we coaxed them out of the closet), and construction has begun on a lovely outdoor coop. Oh, there will be nests, accessible to both them and us; and there will be a human-sized door, and some chicken-sized doors. There will be nice, big girl hen-sized roosts, and they will be nothing like my half-hearted attempt at a roost in the dog/baby chick crate made from half a curtain rod.

We sincerely hope that the thing will be snake-, coati-, coyote-, owl-, and javelina-proof (do javelinas like chicken?). It will have to be Emma-proof as well, as our cockapoo loves to eat things with feathers.

It seems so much wilder here in New Mexico than it was back in New Hampshire, even though we had bears on our deck there. There are so many wild things sniffing/flying/slithering around, looking for chicken dinners.

Those chicken girls might wish they'd never left the guest room.