What's for breakfast?

Its been five months since we first brought chickens into our life - five months of coop building, poop scooping, and traveling the learning curve - and this morning we've enjoyed the rewards of all the expended energy - EGGS for breakfast!

We'd been watching for the "egg squat" that occurs when you stroke the back of a hen that's ready to lay; we'd been listening for the "egg song" that sounds out when they begin to lay...and the last week of July we began to see the squat and hear the beginnings of the singing....every morning, we approached the coop with cautious anticipation.

The first hen laid last Sunday morning - from her roost - so that egg went - well, there's no other word for it - splat. The next morning, the golf balls that were sitting in the nesting boxes did their job and there was a nice brown egg waiting for us. On Tuesday, there were two eggs and yesterday there were four - one more hen to go and all five of our originals will finally leave the category of "free loader" and enter the working world.

Mama however is still in the "free loader" category even though we know that she is laying - somewhere. She went broody on 12 eggs about a month ago in a nest she'd built behind the a/c unit but since then, we've been unable to determine where it is she is laying. The new coop/hen house is almost complete and once the nesting boxes are built in that one, we'll have to lock her in until she begins to lay in them...otherwise, it might be time for the freezer........

Our 3 Little Hens are just past 12 weeks old and won't be laying until October at the earliest and the Babies should be ready in December or January - among this bunch we think we have four Roo's.....the two Little Roos are trying to crow and I love to sit on the front porch and listen for that sound ~ both are beautiful little men but one will eventually have to be rehomed...as will the Baby Roo's....

Anyway....fresh brown eggs for breakfast....yumm....