The Chickens

When we first moved down to Wollongong I was mad keen to have chickens, water tanks and solar power.  I did heaps of research on the chickens and decided in my snobbishness not to have Asa Browns but to get a much more exotic breed.  I decided on bantam Langshams.  These are a beautiful black bird with feathery feet.  I bought four of them from someone up the coast through the internet.  We had to drive miles down the coast to Gerringong pick them up from the breeders friends.  Well this was the easy part.

I had a lovely large pen for them which could be locked and then another outside area fenced around the pen.  Being the champion of free range I decided that the chickens could roam around the yard all day.  They loved it of course.  Especially, digging up all my garden beds.  To protect these I went to all the trouble and expense of buying netting and netting each bed.  After a time it became a nightmare.  They would get under the netting and dig huge holes to have sand baths in.  Nothing abnormal about that all good natural chicken behavior.  I used to get lovely eggs from them as a reward for all this damage.  Beautiful small delicious eggs.

One day one of the chickens was found dead in the pen.  It was one of the best producers so no known reason why - just life.  Another got very sick and I couldn't bear to kill her and eventually she died too.  Both are buried in the garden next to the paw paw tree where I hope they may be of some use.

I also took them to the vets twice for mites in the feet.  All in all I had the most expensive free range eggs in the world.  I wouldn't swap them though for the barn laid variety.

I now have two bantams locked in their enclosed area.  They don't seem unhappy they just won't talk to me.  Won't come near me with a barge pole.  They are fed and watered like royalty all to no avail.  At the moment we haven't had an egg in yonks.  One of the gels got broody, therefore no eggs for weeks and weeks and the other stopped laying also to moult.  It is supposedly biologically impossible to lay whilst moulting.  Everyday I talk to them, feed them and water them, and everyday they treat me like a chicken's worst nightmare.

I also cannot get any new chickens.  My son bought down some Asa Browns for my other son living down here near me.  I put these in the pen with the Langshams  and all hell broke loose.  The Asa Browns are twice the size of my chickens but the dominant Langsham had them all corralled in the cardboard box they came down in.

I thought I would try to keep one of the Asa's but the poor creature was hen pecked and humiliated all day long.  I caught her and took her to the other three hens at my son's place.  Well if people think chickens don't talk to each other then they have another think coming.  The other three chickens surrounded her and they cooed and cawed at each other.  I swear the Asa from my place was telling the other three what a dreadful time she had just experienced and the others were commiserating with her.

Well I have to get my eggs from the Asa Browns whilst my chickens are on strike.