As many of you may know, Kamm McKenzie has a backyard chicken coop at our Computer Drive location. It resides outside my office window. Our 6 birds are 7 months old and we have 4 Silkies, 1 Frizzle and a Polish (aka Cruella da Chicken). We proudly were coup #11 of 18 coups on this year’s tour of backyard chicken coops, Tour d’ Coup. I noticed some different activity from our Miss Frizzle today. She spent the majority of her day sitting in one of the nesting boxes. We have had tiny eggs for about three weeks now, and I am not real sure who has been laying them. The kind gentleman from whom I purchased our biddies was able to sex the Polish and the Frizzle (chicken lingo referring to gender identification of a baby chicken). Apparently, if there is a bump on their beak it’s a boy, and if the beak is smooth it’s a girl. The Polish and the Frizzle are girls. He said, “You can’t sex a Silkie. You just have to wait, and it either crows or lays an egg”, sage advice. Well, we have 4 Silkies. I’m not entirely sure who has been laying eggs, and nobody has crowed yet. I have a high degree of suspicion that our large dark grey Silkie is a boy. He has waddles under his chin, and a growth on top of his beak that the others don’t have. That being said, the sweet feather duster-esque Frizzle has gone broody on us, i.e., sitting on a clutch of eggs. She gets off to eat, drink and poop. I thought it would be fun to place one of our Nest web cams on her nest, and see what transpires in the next 21 days, which is the length of gestation for chickens. With great irony, 21 days from when she started her brood is Labor Day, September 3! We either have fertile eggs, and baby chickens (biddies) will spring forth, or she is sitting on 6-8 sterile eggs and she will give up. They don’t stay broody forever. What do you get if you cross a Frizzle with a Silkie? A Filkie, or more fun, perhaps a Sizzle (suggested by our sonographer, Julie)? We thought you might like to see what happens during her brooding period.
Here is a link to the live video feed from her Nest Koop Kam. Click on the play button to get live video and sound.
Here is the link for our other Koop Kam live video feed from the other end of the koop. Click on the play button to get live video and sound.
Your Feathered Friend,
Dr. Smith
Here is a picture of a mamma chicken on the day I picked up our biddies. She used a planter as a nest. I think it may actually be our Fizzle’s mamma.
