Did I Say No Penguins?

25 CommentsChickens and Fabulous Fowl, Home in the Rookery

After our last trip to the St. Louis zoo, the kids were really begging for some flippery friends in tuxedos, but I held firm.  Or, I thought I did.  Then our Black Copper Marans chicks showed up today, and I wondered if they’d somehow slipped their penguin chicks past me!

This guy is still deciding who he is.  What do you think?

These being penguin chicks would explain why the post office had such a hard time delivering them–and why the chicks were so exhausted from their journey!  But I don’t smell anything ‘fishy’, so I’m going to assume everything is aboveboard and I’ve just got the cutest little Marans chicks known to man!

In fact, I’m thinking I’ve got the lion’s share of fabulous fowl and sensational silkies, too.  I mean, really, what’s not to love in a face like this?

So, I’ve decided to give them their own page, or pages, on the blog.  Aside from how much easier this will make selling chicks and birds, chickens play a role in most my books.  In fact, they’re the stars of the show in my latest as-yet-to-be-revealed middle grade.  It’s time to give them their own page!  That way those of you who come here for all things chickens and guineas will have info and pics collected in one place.  And the rest of you won’t have to be quite so patient with my endless supply of chick pics. 😉

Look for updates to the blog soon, and in the meantime, cross your fingers that our ‘penguin chicks’ put a stop to any talk in this family about getting a zoo license!

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25 Comments

  1. Suzanne Warr

    Reply

    And just in case any of you are interested in this kind of thing–these chicks are from the much-vaunted Wade Jean lines with the super dark ‘chocolate’ eggs! Woohoo! lol

  7. Shelly Johnson DeWitt

    Reply

    My chicks are 2 weeks old now and Copper (the copper maran, of course) is getting beautiful black feathers with a few white feathers on the underside-ish of her wings.

  9. Stephanie Nelson

    Reply

    JEALOUS!!! That’s the breed I want! But I don’t wanna get any until I have a coop that’s impervious to predators (we have tons). Cause everyone knows predators never go for the idiot/free birds. It’s the ones that you actually like & care about that get eaten

  11. Suzanne Warr

    Reply

    Shelly, I don’t buy from hatcheries of any stripe anymore. I’m a snob. lol I got these from a breeder in TX who unfortunately has had to sell her flock due to HOV restrictions. They were about $5 a chick plus shipping, which I considered quite a steal given the line and flock they are from. I find my breeders on http://www.backyardchickens.com and sometimes buy directly from the auctions there.

  12. Suzanne Warr

    Reply

    Stephanie, I know exactly what you mean! And the predators are also much more likely to pick a pullet or hen! Course, who can blame them? Slower and tastier–why wouldn’t they? lol We are super lucky that this property used to house a very large herd of goats and a bunch of donkeys in very secure quarters, so we are yet to run out of space for chickens. Between that and our dog, Zeke, we only lose to predators if we make the mistake of shutting him in and leaving the chickens out after dark. And if we do that, we’re asking for it!

  14. Shelly Johnson DeWitt

    Reply

    Snob. Ha ha. I paid 10 bucks for my Maran. And i ordered 2 Easter Eggers, 2 Leghorns and 1 Welsummer. My Pet Chicken was nice and threw in 2 Barnevelders for free to help keep them all warm. The Barnevelders normally cost 8 bucks a pop so it was nice that they put in some high quality birds to act as packaging peanuts. ha ha

  15. Shelly Johnson DeWitt

    Reply

    I can’t get any more chicks for a few years now because we are up to 18 and our coop is only big enough for 30. Maybe in 3 or 4 years I’ll start adding to the flock as my current layers slow down in production and become better bug eaters than egg makers.

  16. Suzanne Warr

    Reply

    Yep, proud to be a snob! 😛 I like my breeding birds to be show-worthy, etc. and you can’t get that from the hatcheries. But, My Pet Chicken does have some nice birds and get better reviews than most. If I couldn’t go to my local feed store for my laying flock, I’d order from them.

    Oh, and good luck resisting the chicken math! lol

  18. Rachel Martin

    Reply

    Oh! Thanks, Suzanne…actually, I think maybe Terra and Glen might have some too? That is seriously one DARK egg….lol, just in time to make me wish I could grab some clean ones from you to etch for pysanky….

  19. Suzanne Warr

    Reply

    Pysss–what? Egg etching? It sounds cool! Actually, the egg in that pic is only moderately dark by really good BC Marans standards. They’re not milk chocolate! haha Oh, and tell Terra she has good taste! lol

  20. Rachel Martin

    Reply

    Ever heard of Ukrainian Easter Eggs? Psyanky is the actual Ukrainian name for them….you can go through a beeswax/dying process with them, or on thicker shells you can actually etch them using a couple of different processes to really show off the dark outer with the white underlayer.

    • Suzanne

      Reply

      Thanks, I’ve marked them. They sneak in whenever I’ve gone too long without an update…so I’ll get to that sometime, too! 😀

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