My new girls arrived this week

[Icemaiden]

It's been a while since I posted any photos, so please bear with me...

We'd let our flock dwindle to two- one ex-barn hen rehomed via the BHWT and our Chalkhill Blue (she of the 816 eggs and still laying!)

We're now back up to full strength thanks to the addition of a Light Sussex from Fred Ham's cherry orchard lineage


together with a cream legbar (a pure breed this time) and two white leghorns, all from Fred's recommended breeder in Edenbridge (I won't give her details as I haven't asked).


The two leghorns have been named Holly and Alice after our twin nieces who are likewise hard to tell apart :lol:
I think this is Alice, but I can only really tell when they fan their tails out, as Holly has a feather missing at the mo (i.e. she has a "holey" tail )


The run has been divided in two with chicken wire for the quarantine / "getting to know each other" period. This means that Sophie and Nadia are having to make do with half their usual space & are having to sleep in the greenhouse. They're not impressed!!


The Light Sussex is around 6 months old & looks as though she should be in lay- many of her flock mates are laying, so I might yet get a few more eggs per week before Christmas. I'll be pleasantly surprised if I get any white or blue eggs this side of spring though, but we'll see.

It definitely looks as though the Light Sussex will be the new head hen. She's certainly throwing her weight around, and there's plenty of that!

 

[Marigold]

Hi Icemaiden, good to have you back on here, and congrats on the lovely new girls, they all look lovely. I bet the LS will go broody as often as my Marigold of blessed memory, she has that look in her eye I think. Plenty of eggs coming up next year, though, if not before.

 

[Icemaiden]

Hi Marigold.
I'm hoping she won't go broody. I drove all the way from (near) Canterbury to Dorset last time to get my first utility Light Sussex from Chalkhill Poultry, only to find out afterwards that they were using a blood line from 5 miles up the road from me!!! She didn't go broody, so I'm hoping that this one won't either 01

I can but hope...

 

[valeriebutterley]

Lovely girls, Icemaiden.

My two pure Leghorns are getting a bit old and tatty, still laying well, and big eggs, but I love them to bits. I will certainly replace them when the time comes, love their dainty ways and warp speed of life. Great characters, envy you your beauties, forgotten they were ever so fresh, clean and lovely!

 

[Icemaiden]

What's the average life expectancy for a white leghorn, Valerie? Do they live life in the fast lane, laying lots & shuffling off this mortal coil early like "white stars", or will they still be with me, God willing, in another six years or more?

 

[valeriebutterley]

Mine are now about three and a half, so hopefully will go on for another year or so at least. They are utilities not hybrids, so I suspect that they may be a bit longer lived than hybrids, anyway, I hope so.

I will only ever go for purebreeds now, as their life expectancy is much better. Having said that, I have two hybrid bantams one of which has survived two fox attacks, and they go on and on, but they came from a fantastic background of the most beautiful bantams ever. They must be 5 or 6. So I suppose they are F1 hybrids - great crosses!!!!!!! Can you have F1 in chickens?

 

[dinosaw]

They're really nice looking birds Icemaiden. The Sussex really does have the looks of top hen about her, the same as our Lt Sussex who we dub "Queen Mother", she's still leading her chicks around in a private little gang at 14 weeks!. The Legbar really reminds me of Beaker out of the muppets, has a very upright crest. The leghorns should live for around 5 years on average.

Only just spotted this post by the way, things do tend to get lost in the photos of chickens section which would explain why there hasn't been as many comments as you would expect.

 

[Icemaiden]

Thanks Dinosaw.

The legbar now has a middle name. My husband named her "Tufty". Given her ability to bounce over me if I try to pick her up, she's now "Tufty Tigger"!
"Bouncing's what Tiggers do best"...

 

[rick]

and Tiggers are wonderful things!
My 3 seem to have acquired the names Mo, Pom and Lulu. Almost impossible to catch/pick up except in the dark!
I read somewhere that they may start laying at 23 to 30 weeks. I think Betty (out last legbar) started at about 19 or 20 weeks but like your Tufty, these have got much fuller crests and seem more true to type.
They haven't developed proper combs yet but they are starting to get some more colour around their faces now (at 17 weeks.) Betty had a fine but developed comb when she started so I'm guessing that, if they lay at all this side of X-mas, it might be at over 20 weeks at least?

 

[Icemaiden]

I'm guessing no eggs yet Rick? Still, the days start getting longer from tomorrow, so we can but hope for an egg or two in the next few weeks...

 

[Icemaiden]

Farewell Tufty.
You brightened our garden and softened Dad’s heart for 4 1/3 years. Dad took one look at your fluffy headdress and proclaimed “she’s Tufty”, and so you got your name.

Cute, with a determination “not to miss out”, you’d be the first to get your beak into anything, including an egg that I didn’t retrieve quickly enough. I put out an eggshell full of English mustard & you were straight into that too- that was the last of your egg-eating exploits! In your younger years you were quite happy not to be picked up, though in the last year you’ve been happy to be held and cuddled; it took the weight off of your legs.

While not our most prolific egg layer, you did produce 318 beautiful blue shelled eggs, the last one around your 4th birthday, in July last year. As age started to catch up with you, you took to roosting on the floor of the coop rather than on a perch, & when I put you onto a perch at night, your legs would seize up. I think a fair few forum members can relate to that…

When our adopted hens arrived last autumn, you didn’t have the energy to exert your place in the flock or to run away when they pecked at you. You accepted their unwanted attention with dignity, but spent more and more time skulking in the coop or underneath it. Finally, I had to face up to the fact that you weren’t enjoying life any more, and that, sadly, it was time to let you go.

I hope that you’re snuggled up in a coop in heaven right now, amidst a field of tasty green stuff, where the foxes are vegan. I hope you’ve met the hens who called our run home before you did, and that they’ve made you feel at home. There’s a Tufty-shaped hole in our flock now and in our hearts, but I hope you’re happy again.
RIP Tufty.

 

[Marigold]

Ahh, so sorry Icemaiden. She sounds a wonderful girl. She was very lucky to have had such a long and happy life, and such good care from you.

 

[dianefairhall]

So sad about Tufty. It sounds like you have many lovely memories of her.

 

[Icemaiden]

 

[Margaid]

So sorry to read that. I expect her friends were waiting at the end of the bridge.

 

[Marigold]

So sorry to read that. I expect her friends were waiting at the end of the bridge.

Let’s hope she doesn’t have any problems getting re-integrated!

 

[Icemaiden]

Thank you...

I know I did the right thing though I probably should have done it sooner. It's still hard though...