Spring Chickens!

Here is yet another post on these darling little fuzzy chicks, except they look a little more like gawky, not quite sure about their place in this world yet, teens than cute babies anymore. Their fuzz is giving way to pin feathers, which I've learned are the beginnings of actual feathers. They start to appear on their wings and tail first. As you can see from this picture, their poor heads must be last!

The chicks made their way from the feed store to our laundry room, then out to the garage because I was becoming aware of an "odor" in the house and then finally out to their permanent home in the the newly fashioned chicken coop in the backyard. This would be that story...
As responsible chicken owners in the desert it was obvious that we needed to make a couple minor (what we thought would be minor) adjustments to the yard before we could let them have run of the place. We started with a wall from the house across the side yard to the block wall on the other side. It was necessary to 1. act as another barrier for the coyotes to hurdle before the chickens became dinner and 2. help hide them from a disapproving HOA. We first started with a block wall. Poured footings, rebar, the whole deal. Then in a spur of the moment idea we decided a wood fence would be a better idea. Out come the footings, rebar, etc. Should I mention what an ordeal all that was? Digging + Arizona desert = UGH. Then digging out the concrete, ha. The fence was no picnic either. Broken shovels, sledgehammers, jackhammers and post-hole diggers.... Finally we have fence posts! WAIT! No we don't. Jeeps, lovely, stubborn tortoise that she is, gets curious about things going on in her yard and proceeds to knock the posts out of the concrete while we went inside to eat dinner. Can you say, "no rest for the weary?" Poor Travis. After all that drama and more than a few days here is where we are: Posts and supports.

Then slats. Hooray!

A complete fence, whew! There is still a little work to be done, but the chicks don't care. For posterity I think it is worth noting that I assume this redwood fence will weather and turn silver with time....

The completed chicken coop. I loved that conversation. Me: "Kids great news! We're going to get you guys chickens." Kids: "Cool, can they live in my room?" Me: "Ah, no. How about your playhouse?"

It's custom. One-of-a-kind. Here are the babies checking out their new digs. The new sod should be in soon and someday a garden... Chicken heaven. Now they just have to hold up their end of the deal and keep our digs bug-free, we'll see!