well, we are down to 15 chickens. i gave away the big white ameraucana rooster. the lady that took him asked me if i was sure...he was beautiful and she was planning on showing him...uh, yeah...he tried to spur my 12 year old in the face...can't have a bird that's like that. i have too many little kids around to have that kind of aggressive bird around. she is our project leader in poultry. she said we may find that we have problems with whoever steps up to the top of the pecking order. she also recommended that i "get rid" of all but one rooster. that means the 5 of the 6 roosters we have left. well, haley wasn't too happy...and josh cried for about 20 minutes...until i told them that i wouldn't "get rid" of their roosters...yet. haley's rooster she has eating out of her hand...but he pecks everyone's hands when he comes close to you now. he's a nice looking rhode island red (well except that his comb isn't perfect), so if you know anyone that would like a nice rooster...let me know. josh's is a beautiful ameraucana rooster. but he's not a solid color so he can't be shown. he's a beautiful white with black splashes. he's actually pretty nice too. i mean if my 4 year old can pick him up and hold him in his lap and pet him? he's got to be pretty good. as for the other roosters? they are all polish crested. not much meat to them. i'm not sure what to do with them. i would like some whole chickens for cooking, but i don't know if they would be worth it. haley's and josh's would be, but i don't know that i can do that to them right now.

i had the kids put the chickens out the other day. it was really pretty out and i thought they would like getting out. they did. of course the kids were all gone and i looked up and saw it was dark...and the chickens were still out. so i got my coat, grabbed a bucket of feed, and went out to bring in the chickens. they were all huddled in the corner..but i heard a rustle in the opposite corner. so i went over to make sure it wasn't one of the darker ones hiding in the dark corner...nope, it wasn't. then i saw movement at the top of the pen...it was an opossum. well, it took me a couple of seconds to react, well, correctly. at first i was going to grab it by it's tail and look at it a little closer (not a smart move). i stopped myself, held the bucket in both my hands and hit that little sucker as hard as i could off the top of the pen (without spilling the food).

*question: do opossums eat chickens? i mean like pretty much full grown chickens? i could see them getting some chicks, but they are more scavengers than hunters (i think). *

it was pretty funny though. i told my hubby about it and he gave me a hard time about it. "what if it was a mom with babies in her pouch?" "maybe you should go look and see if you knocked any out when you hit her". no no, dear reader, he isn't really worried about that little creature. he just knows that they are one of my favorite animals, and was surprised i was so protective of the chickens i guess. or he just likes giving me a hard time. yeah, i think that's more like it.

now we are ordering more chicks from http://www.ideal-poultry.com/ (thanks jayedee). we are getting some quail belgian d'anver bantams, and some buckeyes. please don't tell the hubby! he's wasn't too happy when i said something about getting some different ones. so i figure when they get here in march, he should have forgotten by then.

good pic of the bantams here http://www.waidinmiki.com/Ryan/Ryan.html

good pic of the buckeyes here http://www.mypetchicken.com/images/product_images/Large/buckeye-bc.jpg

now i'm not a huge fan of the buckeyes. they don't look very cool to me. i really tried to talk him into getting some black australorps. they are really pretty with shiny black feathers. http://www.mypetchicken.com/images/ChickenPix/medium/FRE_AstlrpCk_1_M.jpg
but he's raising them, so i'm trying to let him choose. i tried to talk him into the japanese bantams too. http://www.freewebs.com/professorchickensbreeds/japwheatenpair.jpg. well, i hope he does well with them.

i have to go. zack is going to the doctor today. he's been running a fever since friday, with a cough and runny nose...oh and throwing up a couple of times too. saturday night his fever was 104.6...and it only went down to 104.2 an hour after his dose of motrin. i had to put him in the tub to get it down. talk about freaking me out. i hate it when they get sick! especially when we haven't gotten the new insurance card yet. we have insurance, they just haven't sent our card to us yet.