Six Weeks

The chicks turn 6 weeks old today.

“They” say that six week old chicks can go outside, but “They” also say that’s true “when the chicks are fully feathered.” For me, those two things don’t exist in the same chick!

Robert set up the temporary Chicken Run in my office backyard as a place for the chicks to go outside until we are done with the coop and then we’ll attach it to the coop. He finished on Sunday, so we took the chicks outside for an hour, since it was warm.

They also were outside yesterday for a few hours. Today, it’s too cold. They aren’t all feathered out to be outdoors over night.

I finally know the breed of all but one chick, and I’ve also given them names.

The final image is of Robert, down on his knees attaching the chicken wire to the coop run frame. It’s an amazing gift to have a husband who supports all my passions.

The name Wyandotte has an interesting history – mostly attached to a Native American tribe, a town in OK and a city in MI. Curiously, the name of the breed doesn’t have specific ties to any of those references.

This is a feather footed breed, and the two I have are grossly different in size and development of feathers.

I call her Bitsy because she is so tiny compared to all the others.

I’m going off some “chicken experts” on a Chicken site regarding her breed, although one person say I will need to wait longer to know for sure.”

I’ve always thought that the two buff colored chicks with smooth legs were the same breed. However, this chick holds her tail high (the – named Grace – doesn’t) and this chick has dark brown streaking in her tail feathers (and some of her wing feathers) which the other doesn’t. So, I’m still trying to figure out what breed she is. For now, she is named for her yellow leg band.

This is a rare breed in the USA, but apparently quite prevalent in the country of origin – Egypt. She’s been a complete crazy-ass since the day she arrived, and she hasn’t changed!

This is the chick that, when her “crown” feathers were developing, she was pecked by a few other chicks. It’s no longer red and she’s developing new pin feathers on her head – but, truly, I really love her look at this time. I like that I can see her eyes, and that she sports that 80’s hairdoo.

Quaff (which in street slag is used for the term Coif) and is easier for me to remember how to spell, clearly is sporting a coif hair style, hence her name. Personally, I would like to be able to see her eyes!

This chick is so friendly and she developed much faster than the others. This breed is known to be a super-duper egg layer (between 250-300 a year!)

This breed has a “muff” and “beard” which you can see is developing in the bottom-right photo. I named her Blue because she will lay blue colored eggs.

I have a good husband.