So about 6 months ago I moved to my beautiful home that rests on almost an acre. Plenty of room for children, animals, fruit trees and whatever my imagination brings in the years to come. When we moved in my third baby girl was born a short month later so the idea of looking after farm animals and a veggie patch were possibly not going happen this year.....
However, my kind brother bought me two hens just before I moved in! So shortly after my baby was born my hubby created a bit of an enclosure for them...
We were never sure of their age or history and unfortunately never got an egg from them. They also didn't last too long.....thanks to the fox that took it away to the foxes cave ( as my 3 yr old would say!) I was a bit sad when the second one got taken as she became quite tame, allowing all of us to pat her 😀
Now although I didn't want any chickens I kind of got used to looking after them so I decided to get 5 white leghorn pullets. I decided with that breed as I heard they were great layers and apparently these 5 were due to lay in about 4 weeks....4 weeks went by and still no eggs...
I was about to send these chickens back! They were eating a tonne of food, both pellets and all our kitchen scraps, drinking fresh water every day and occasionally escaping from their enclosure! Not fun trying to capture 5 flighty leghorns!!
Now in the past I had chickens and used the deep litter method of keeping their house clean...laying fresh straw on top of dirty straw and as the others broke down I would remove and use it in the garden...
My 6 year old daughter has recently been put onto 'chicken duty' at school and she told me that they take out all the old dirty straw and replace it so I decided to give it ago....to much relief I got 4 eggs that day!!, and have consistently got 4 or 5 every single day since.
So my theory is that some chickens ( such as my old isa Browns) may be happy to live and lay by using the deep litter method but white leghorns are fussy!! They need fresh, sweet smelling straw and then you'll get your eggs.
Since they have started laying they have also become really tame, crouching down waiting for a pat, stopped escaping and following me around like mother hen! So happy chickens, happy mama😊
The question now is what to do with all those eggs.....
