You can see the corner where Gizmo dug enough to screw things up. I put the cinder blocks here for extra defense.

Rebuilt from the ground up. I like this design much better. A few trim pieces left to add. It leaves room to add a few external nest boxes later on when everyone is laying. I put a 5 gallon bucket in for now for them to use but Kitty and Vanessa just lay in the corner.

The entire roof hinges up to give complete access inside the coop. I originally had a few roost bars installed but none of the girls used them, so I didn’t bother installing them in here. I should add them anyway just in case.

Vanessa and Kitty. Vanessa is an Ameraucana that is just under a year old. She is flighty and lets her presence be known. We got her at Marshall Grain near downtown Fort Worth. The last few Saturdays they made arrangements with a few people from around the area to bring some ladies that were close to laying or laying already. This is nice as most feed stores just sell baby chicks. We got there early and secured a place in line. They had a Wyandotte that I really wanted but someone nabbed her up quickly.

A small reference to Finding Nemo there in the title.

Over the course of a week and half we have lost 3 chickens and gained two.

Miss Softy, who was our little baby chick went to chicken heaven after Gizmo dug a small space under the run and she made her way into the big world and got taken out pretty quick. I had left her and Fluffy out of their small cage inside the run for the evening to let the continue getting used to their bigger feathery friends. So it was kind of my fault. Like 1% maybe.

Since Zoe was so upset about it (and furious at Gizmo to boot) we decided to go back to the feed store and get another to replace her. We got a replacement for the Ameraucana and ended up getting a Wellsummer pullet as well. We got them home and they were having a grand old time in their new home for less than a day before then meet their maker.

It wasn’t long after I took this shot of the three of us playing ‘pirates’ that either Gizmo or the cats somehow pulled back a corner of chicken wire and took both of them out and had their way with them. I only realized anything was wrong when I saw Sugar (our white cat) walking out from said hole. I can’t put the entire blame on her as I don’t now exactly which animal made the hole. I did some patch work to last for the evening and the next day made a trip Lowe’s for some hardware cloth. I completely rebuilt the coop last Sunday. No more a-frame style tractor. After getting everything they way I wanted it, we made a prison out of the run, leaving the original chicken wire around the bottom and going over that with the new hardware cloth. And instead of using staples we opted for the more secure u-shaped poultry nails.If the cats and dogs are able to get through this, then bravo.
All Zoe knows about this missing birds is that they somehow got out and flew away sometime during the night.

Here you can see Duck (our oldest cat) and Kitty. We got her from the lady across the street who was trying to find her a new home. She is just over a year old. We’ve had her a week and she has taken things pretty well to her new home and friends. She likes to roam the garden and explore a lot. She has already had to fiend off Gizmo from getting to close to Fluffy.

So as of now we have Rosie, Tiana, Fluffy, Kitty, and Vanessa. I’ll tell you about Vanessa tomorrow.

I’ve been wanting to get into chicken raising for some time now. Last week I put together a run and coop and this past weekend we were able to track down a few young pullets in east Fort Worth. After we got them back home and into their place, Stephanie mentioned that the run seemed a bit large for just two chickens and mentioned we should run and get one of the chicks we saw a feed store in Keller. Somehow I was able to weasel in a second chick.

Rosie. She’s a Rhode Island Red. I tend to call her momma. She has established herself as the leader of the group.

Tiana is a Black Australorp. She is a sweetie.

This Cuckoo Marans is named Miss Fuzzy. Only six weeks old and already a handful. The one great thing about her is that she is friendly to her younger friend and keeps her under her wing at night.

The younger friend, Miss Softie, is an Ameraucana. She is too young yet to really have a personality. She doesn’t even have all her feathers yet and should probably be under a heat light another week or so, but Miss Fuzzy seems to be keeping her warm enough.

I’m keeping the youngsters in a cage inside the run for now. Rosie likes to peck at Miss Softie and instead of risking having a dead chick, these two will sty in here for while.