chickens

When I first started on this chicken adventure a year ago, I ordered my chicks by mail from a hatchery in Iowa. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of ordering three roosters, and even more unfortunately, they mistakenly sent me four of them, leaving me with just 21 laying hens.

Time, elements, a blockheaded hound dog, and a .22 have whittled the flock from 25 birds to 20 a year later, including the one rooster who met his demise at the business end of my son's rifle because he was just too mean to keep. That leaves me with 3 remaining roosters and just 17 laying hens.

I have been mulling whether or not to attempt to replace the missing birds, and have vacillated between not wanting any more of them to concern myself with and thinking of all the folks who have gotten into the habit of buying eggs from us. No mail-order hatchery will sell fewer than 25 birds, however, and I knew I did not want that many. If I was going to get them, it would have to be locally.

New chicks purchased today at L&M Supply in Cloquet.

New chicks purchased today at L&M Supply in Cloquet.

Casey and I had just sat down to watch a movie last night when I looked out the window and noticed movement in the trees across the yard, on the other side of the fence. It didn't look like a deer, which we are accustomed to seeing out there, so I looked carefully to try and identify the source of the movement. All I saw was a dark gray to almost black blob at first - hard to tell the color exactly due to the light and shadows of the setting sun - until it raised it's head and I knew I was looking at either a large coyote or a wolf.