Empty space, dog extension, not guilty until proven crowing, new housing, chicken drama, overhead irritation

So when I got home on Friday evening it was to a totally empty driveway, meaning the party van was picked up by the towing company to be repurposed in whatever way possible to raise a few dollars for the Humane Society.  It felt very weird not seeing the outline of the party van standing guard in front of my home like it has for the last 6 years.  I guess I’ll get used to it.

Originally the dogs were going to get dropped off back at Ali’s place on Saturday morning however Ali had plans to work all day Saturday.  I figured the dogs would have a hell of a lot more fun staying out at the house all day with us than alone in an empty townhouse so I asked if we could drop them off on the way to the movies Saturday night, which Ali was fine with.  Well we wound up not going to the movies Saturday night and it turned out the dogs were with us until this morning, as I dropped them off on my way to work.

We love having the dogs obviously but we pay a severe sleep penalty when they are over most nights.  Sadie is a light sleeper and is ready to go out on the lanai at any time of the night.  If she is on the bed and awake, many times her breathing is heavy enough that it sends a constant vibration through the mattress which makes it near impossible to sleep.  Nicki, who sleeps soundly a good portion of most days, saves her nosiest time for nights.  In her old age she will randomly make wretching sounds as well as do heavy, loud panting that keeps both Cindy and I awake.  After five nights of this we both are feeling rather Walking Deadish, which may partially explain my bad mood yesterday.

So Saturday morning I heard Cindy say “I knew it!” loudly.  I was on the computer and had no idea what she was talking about.  She was referring to her suspicion that Nona was a rooster.  Her suspicion was confirmed when Nona started crowing at early morning sun.  Nona has been showing rooster personality traits, starting fights with all of the other chickens and just being generally aggressive.  In addition Nona’s wattle was bigger than all the other chickens and his feet were quite large as well, although Kathy and Curly have rather big feet as well, which has us concerned. (more on this later)

So we knew Nona had to go, we had expressed our concern about some of the chickens being roosters to the woman we got them from.  She told us then that if any turned out to be roosters we could return him.  We called and left a message letting her know we definitely had a rooster.

Even though Cindy and I knew a rooster would not fit into our backyard chicken formula we felt very sad about the idea of ejecting Nona from the flock.  Nona was the chicken that was sick very early on, laying weakly on Cindy’s lap as she rubbed him.  Nona was also the chicken that spent a night in our guest bathroom.  It’s weird that s(he) turned out to be the dominant rooster.  We hoped to hear from Anna soon so we could get the return over with, we didn’t hear back on Saturday.

Saturday morning Cindy and I did a three mile run, based out the Dunkin Donuts parking lot.  I never felt comfortable during the run.  We got a late start, meaning the warmer temps and humidity were more of a factor.  The 9:11 pace I averaged felt like an effort level of at least 45 seconds a mile faster.  I just was not enjoying myself.

After doing a shit load of yard work which included full lawn maintenance which had not be done for at least a month, we headed out for some errands with the dogs along for the ride.  We took the Prius which will be the defacto dog transport vehicle most of the time.  I tried to make it somewhat party van like for Nicki by laying the comforter that used to be on the bed in the van across the trunk area of the Prius.  The dogs seemed fine back there but I still felt guilty for taking their van away.

One of the places Cindy and I stopped was Sam’s.  When I was shopping there on Friday I saw these 10’x8′ sheds they were selling for a reasonable number.  Instantly a light bulb went off in my head.  Either this shed could be the new coop or it could be used to hold the stuff in my smaller shed, allowing that to be turned into a coop.

Cindy liked the shed a lot and seemed to favor making it the coop building since it’s polyethelene shell (with a steel frame) would make for easy clean up and more sanitary conditions.  For a mounting surface I figured I could make a slightly raised 8×10 wood platform that is concreted into the ground for stability and to keep it out of water during wet season.  We both agreed it was cool but did not pull the trigger on a purchase quite yet.

On Saturday we squashed the idea of going to the movies.  We were both tired from dog sleep deprivation plus we had Nightcrawler sitting in the Netflix envelope.  It was a decent flick.  Jake Gyllenhaal does a fantastic job at playing a really creepy and deranged character.  His acting performance gets an A, the movie gets a B+.

So Sunday we headed out to do several things.  We visited the course for the 10K I am timing in a couple weeks to mark the halfway point where I intend to have Cindy running the split timing for me. We had decided we were going to go with the shed from Sam’s.  I stopped at Home Depot to grab the stuff I would need to build the platform, well at least the frame of it.  I would go back to get the pressure treated plywood cut to size once I had the frame built.

We pulled into Sam’s ready to load up the shed as well, wanting to take advantage of the special in store pricing which was something like $500 less than what it showed online for the same shed.  Well we were bummed to hear they sold their last in stock unit on Saturday.  They said they would be getting more but could not tell us when.  The advice was to just call the store each day to check, that’s convenient.

We finally heard back from Anna on Sunday, she agreed to call us back a little after lunch to set up a meeting.  She said she had a hen from the same lot we could switch out.  Originally Cindy and I weren’t even concerned with getting a hen in return but since it was offered we were ok with it.  Well we didn’t get to meet up with Anna until later in the afternoon.

Rounding up Nona was depressing.  We got the other three chickens back in the coop and then tried to grab Nona.  He was freaked out and hyper ventilating as he paced rapidly in front of the coop, just wanting to be reunited with the chickens on the other side.  I finally was able to grab him.  I held and petted him as I walked over to the cat carrier to put him in.  I felt pretty terrible. On the ride to meet Anna Nona was making noises that Cindy and felt like he was saying “I don’t want to go”.  He was going to be going back to a much more congested chicken environment that will surely not be up to the standard he has become accustomed to in his month or so at our place.  I was frustrated that we were in this situation because he was misjudged as a female in the first place.

We have additional anxiety because we have bad suspicions that possibly two of our three chickens might also be roosters, although they haven’t crowed yet.  Both of them, especially Kathy have large feet and bodies that seem more rooster like.  If we have to go through this again it is going to suck.  Cindy said it was like waking up one day and having your pet undergo a sex change.

So the chicken Anna had for us in exchange was definitely a hen but again not what we thought she would be.  Anna said she was from the same buff orpington  set of chicks the others were from.  This hen was much more reddish brown.  At best she could be a buff/rhode island red cross breed but definitely not a pure orpington.  We already knew we had another misidentified bird at home, Lola, who is probably at least half americana.  All of this gender and breed screw ups with the chicken lady make me not want to use her as our chicken lady going on from here.  I think the next chickens Cindy and I will get will be sexed, baby pullets from Rural King where we can raise them from scratch, making them much less scared of us.

So we put Nona in a cage in the back of their van and put the new hen in our other carrier.  I felt really bad giving Nona away but tried to just focus on why it had to be that way.  The new hen was very scared and did not make a peep on the way back to the house.

When we got home I wanted to just let the chickens out of their coop so they could mingle with the new hen in an open space.  Cindy thought we should put the new hen in the coop right away so she would know that was home base.  I was worried this could be problematic as chickens can be territorial.  Well it was a problem.

Instantly there were menacing sounding noises and body language from Kathy and Curly.  They cornered the new hen and started bullying her, even pecking at her a few times.  I instantly pulled the run away from the coop so the chickens could come out.  Even with 4 feet of open space Kathy and Curly were staying put, acting aggressive.  Cindy and I were not happy.  This aggressive behavior by the two chickens (Lola didn’t care) added additional weight to our fear that we have at least one if not two more roosters under roof.

Eventually the chickens came out from the run and started exploring.  The new hen came out as well but was very scared and nestled herself in one of the landscaped areas for quite awhile.  The other chickens went after her quite a bit early but as time passed the aggression lessened somewhat.  The new hen started to calm down a bit and started roaming the yard, following the other chickens around.  Of course if she got too close the two possible roosters would take a few aggressive steps in her direction which would send her running away.

Cindy and I were worried that the chickens would not allow the new hen to come up into the coop to sleep at night.  We made provisions by covering the run with a comforter so if need be she could sleep down below.  The three chickens went up for bed while the new chick was out wondering around.  After Cindy and I carefully steered her into the coop we crossed our fingers she would be allowed to go up top.  It took awhile but just as the last rays of daylight were expiring she slowly and cautiously made her way up the ramp.  I didn’t hear any squawking which was a relief.  Cindy and I are hoping a night sleeping together will mean they will be more amenable together during the day today.  I have to admit I am nervous leaving them alone today and wish I was home to chicken sit.

Late in the day I did some beginning work on the frame for the shed, cutting the frame support 4×4’s to length.  My hope was doing some work would help take the edge of my mood that was undeniably irritable.  I was not very pleasant to be around and unfortunately Cindy got to catch some of the thorns of my bad mood.  After apologizing later I told her I think it had to do mostly with having two large projects looming over my head, the house flooring and the chicken coop construction.  When paired with poor sleep and the chicken related drama it just added up to a bad day.

Last night we had yet another highly interrupted sleep session.  Cindy and I wound up moving to the guest bedroom at 3:30 am, leaving the dogs to their own means so we could at least get a little sleep.  Tonight we should sleep like logs hopefully.