Backyard Babies: Silkie Chickens!

Worms are all well and good but they're far from exciting and, especially at this time of year, they don't eat that much. The property's chicken coop, on the other hand, was just dying for some residents and I've finally gotten my hands on a pair. It's time to introduce the newest family members, my sweet baby silkie chickens!

While I never spent enough time around my mother's chickens for them to like me - the times I went in to feed them or collect eggs they flapped and squawked like I was pulling feathers - I've always wanted to have some of my own and when I moved in and saw this little coop in the corner (underneath all those seaside daisies) it felt like fate.

It needed a bit of work - the roof has been used as a dumping place for various old garden hoses, and the inside is full of old straw, large sticks and (I don't even want to know why) a bunch of old animal bones. Still, it had a feeder and a water dispenser and a built-in laying box (you can see that on the right, under a layer of composting leaves) and what more could a chicken want?

It was also home to a good crop of nightshade, but once I decided to get chickens I got rid of that well in advance and haven't seen it come back so hopefully we are free of it. The spider webs were thick and old but thankfully seemed uninhabited when I came through and got rid of them - with a roof that low I run way too high a risk of having them land in my hair when I'm in there. The weeds in the foreground lasted for about an afternoon after the girls moved in - they are all about eating thistles.

When they first came home they were tiny, fluffy, scrawny little things. I named the bold black one Janeway and the shy brown Scully (after two of my tv lady heroes of course). From the beginning Janeway has been curious and bossy, and Scully has hidden behind her whenever danger presented, and trailed after her when it didn't.

Two weeks in and they're fat and happy. Still mostly fluff-balls but on their wings their grown-up feathers are beginning to show - they're around eight to ten weeks old now. They're some kind of silkie/frizzle/bantam mix and you can see their silkie head feathers and they have a little bantam fluff on their feet, but we'll have to wait for their feathers before we can see how much frizzle they have.

They're completely unfazed by rain - we had a crazy storm this week, and while my courtyard flooded and trees came down all over, these guys were out in it hunting bugs. I caught them still damp in the morning when I brought them out some food (which they pounced on as if I had been starving them).

Spending time in the garden has an extra element of joy to it now, as I hear them cheeping to each other in the background (and sometimes I can hear them from the kitchen, too, if the window is open). My weeding has been making a lot more progress now that there's someone to appreciate the effort and their antics have yet to not make me smile. I'm looking forward to the eggs, when they come, but it's not the main attraction. I think I'm mostly just glad for the company.