It’s chick season and a lot of you have fluffy ones on order. Some of you are being a bit more spontaneous and are scooping up chicks that you see peeping away at the feed store (hard to resist!) If you already have a flock, you can’t just add the chicks to the group. They need to be kept in a brooder, where the temperature starts out at over 90 degrees, there are no drafts, and appropriate food and water is right at hand. But, even more importantly than that, the chicks need to be kept safe from the older girls. The hens, unlike you, don’t say, Babies, how cute! Rather, they’ll yell, Intruders! Get them! So, you’ll need a brooder and separate housing for your new birds until they are fully feathered out and can be integrated into the flock (for more about that see this post, and then this one.)

Perhaps you have a broody hen, and you think, Finally! I can put her to use! The idea is that you tuck the day-old chicks under her at night, she wakes up, sees that she’s a mother, and sallies forth to care of her babies. No heat lamp needed. This is actually a great idea if the hen is seriously broody and if you have separate housing for her. Even the most protective mama hen can’t keep her chicks safe from an angry flock. What you’ll need is a broody coop. My vintage chicken keeping manuals are full of designs for them.

Often, this is how farmers raised all of their chicks. The hens were kept apart and the chicks (under the guidance of a young farmer, as seen below) could forage and mingle.

Sadly, I see many prefab coops on the market that are based on this design and being sold as housing for adult, urban flocks. These are not appropriate for anything other than sheltering the hen and chicks for the first month. For more about coop design, see this FAQ, and go to my Pinterest page where you’ll find some examples of good small coops.

I’ve always wanted to tuck chicks under a broody hen, but my broodies always, right before the chicks arrive, snap out of it and foil my plans. Have you had any success? Tell me!

At first glance this is simply an old blurry photo of a couple of dogs on a farmhouse porch.

The big dog in front is a classic, basic mixed breed. He’s a good, practical, useful dog.

His sidekick is another story. This pup has a toy dog’s smushed in nose and spaniel ears. He’s clearly a pet.

(Does this remind you a bit of Lily and Scooter?)

But, look again. The little dog is wearing a sweater. And a hat. Look again. It’s not just a hat, it’s a metal helmet with feathers decorating it. Notice, too, that despite the dog’s tongue sticking out, that he carries himself with a regal bearing.

I’ve no idea what these two are up to. What do you think?

More vintage dog images can be found in Vintage Dog Photographs: 30 Postcards. Available in the HenCam Store.

What I love about vintage cat photos is that the cats aren’t groomed and sleek. They’re scruffy. The boy in this photograph has been made to wear his fanciest outfit – heavens, a satin bow and ruffles! His hair is clean (rare in an age when baths happened at best once a week.) But the cat? Nothing slick and shiny about her. The cat looks to be a useful mouser. I can practically hear the self-satisfied purr.

He has a basket with eggs filled with candy, and even a toy rabbit, but this young boy has no need for chicks in his Easter basket, because he has a mama hen and her babies right in his backyard!

What’s going to be in your Easter basket?

NOTE: In this photograph (from around 1910) the hen is living in what is often called a broody coop. This is a temporary shelter for a hen to sit on her eggs, hatch out her chicks, and care for them for about a week, safely away from the rest of the flock. These days, some catalogs are selling similar shelters, billed as urban coops for small flocks. Don’t purchase one! You’ll have flock health and behavior issues. Read this FAQ for coop design criteria that will keep your chickens happy and healthy, and take a look at my Pinterest page where I have an annotated collection of small coops to give you ideas.

Every week, my hens lay at least one or two especially beautiful eggs. I can’t bear to crack them and throw out the shells. So, I save those speckled, brightly colored, striped, or otherwise egg-cellently colored eggs. I use a clever little tool to blow them out. (Unlike the expression you can’t have your cake and eat it too, you CAN have your eggs and have the shells, too!) I take some of these eggs to show off to children when I do school visits, but most of the eggs get displayed in a (very) large egg basket (it’s now half-full!).

Yesterday I hosted a Passover seder. This is a meaningful meal composed of many courses. It goes on for a couple of hours. Our seder has much laughter and wide-ranging conversation. The table sets the mood. I like it to be beautiful, yet relaxed, and charming yet traditional. This year, there were eleven at the table. I used eggs as place holders.

(Part of the seder tradition is that everyone sits on pillows. I’m sure that some of you have already noticed the pillows on the right-hand chairs.)

This gave me an excuse to use both my blown out eggs, and my collection of egg cups.

This time of year, there are plenty of holiday gathering that use eggs as part of the imagery and festivities. One of my readers, Stacey, uses eggs as place holders for her Easter table. She uses photographs. No one minds being an egg head in her family! (Directions for this craft are here.)

What decorations are you making with your blown out eggs? Let me know in the comments!