Raising Laundry Room Chickens

Uh…I meant to say…backyard chickens.

Except mine are currently living in my laundry room, since that is the warmest room in our house.  It makes a good brooder.

Yesterday, I got four two-week-old balls of fluff from our local feed store.  The store said they will grow up to be Rhode Island Reds, which are good, reliable laying hens.  I really hope they are all girls.  Knowing me, I’ll be attached by the time I can tell what their gender is, and will be heart-broken if I have to give away a little teenage rooster.   Hopefully that will not happen.

I planned on getting chicks as soon as we moved into our new house, but 3 ½ years later, I was still feeling nervous about it.  Making the decision to get chickens was a difficult one for me.  I was so concerned that I would somehow not provide a good home for them.  I can never take on an animal without thinking of all their needs, the responsibility of caring for them all their lives, and of course, every possible thing that could go wrong.  I wish I could be a little more spontaneous about getting pets, but that’s just not me.  If I’m going to do something, I’m going to do it well, and I’m going to worry about it the entire time.

<Sigh>

Anyway, my parents (probably realizing that my feet-dragging was getting in the way of what I really wanted), graciously got me a starter chicken coop at Christmas time.  And, seven months later, I got the nerve up to assemble it and put it in my garden.  Isn’t it cute?

 

So, now I have a coop in my garden and chicks in my laundry room.  I raised chickens when I was a teenager, so it’s not completely new to me, plus I have researched a lot online for the past few years.  I still feel like I have no idea what I’m doing.  But the chicks survived the night and are acting like normal birds, peeping, strutting, scratching, and stretching their tiny wings.  So I must be doing something right. 

They’re adorable now, but I’m really looking forward to putting them in their new chicken coop.  That just seems where they belong. 

Not in my laundry room!