Homestead Light Condensed: It's an addiction, really.

Who knew? Who knew that it would be so compelling...so intriguing...so........dare I say, addicting?

I got on craigslist (not the addiction, although can be somewhat addicting) and was looking at free stuff (somewhat more addicting, but not MY addiction) and there was someone giving away a bunch of old hay. Soooooo being who I am, I investigate and find out that it's not like it's USED hay, just hay that falls off the bale when they go to feed it to their horses. Dry, stale hay.

PERFECT!

Here's the idea - the pig pen gets a bit ..... um ...... odiferous at times and although mucking it out is an option (and one that is utilized here at Our Aspirin Acres) it just doesn't seem to really keep up with the job. I have FOUR, count them FOUR pigs here and we are a small homestead in the middle of the city. Can you say,"Codes Department?" No really ... I can wave hello to the Code Enforcement guys as they arrive for work in the morning. It's a good thing we're zoned agricultural. Just one of those things that I think slipped through the cracks in new development and not something I want them to reconsider.

Sooooo...... (get back on track, get back on track)

So I made arrangements to go out and get my free hay. My plan is to then spread it all over the pig pen and let them stir it up, into the muck and help to dilute and decompose the ... muck. There really doesn't seem to be a better word for it - I tried. (Muck really IS mucky, by the way).

So I figured, since I was heading in the general direction of most of the agricultural places around here, I'd check craigslist and see if anyone had some laying hens to get rid of fairly cheap. (aHA!!! finally... I'm finally arriving at the addiction part. I think chickens are addictive. Call me a collector. But I reason it away saying that since we ended up with so many roosters, we are going to have to balance out the flock.)

And since I can't turn down a bargain.. we now have 4 more hens in the hen-house. This time I bought them at laying age so I would be pretty sure that they are not roosters. I even watched the man remove one from the nest of eggs she was trying to hatch. Ok, so I have at least ONE more hen, or a small rooster with motherly instincts.

These are bantam hens; smaller than the other hens that I have, but the size of the eggs that I saw were a very nice size brown egg.

So, without further adieu....Our Aspirin Acres is proud to present.......

The New Hens on the Block!!!!!!!
Woooooohooooooo!!!!!!!!! (Applause please)

Ok, so I could only get three to pose at one time - I thought that was pretty good. The fourth chicken is also a black and white Barred Rock Bantam. The one in the back is a Rhode Island Red Bantam.

I was a bit concerned about putting them into an existing flock so I stopped at a produce stand and the nice man behind the counter was happy to give me a couple of super-ripe watermelon from his throw away pile to help "sweeten" the pot.

I chopped the watermelon into several pieces, threw it into the pen to distract the others and let the new chickens out.

There was quite a scuffle as the old girls were realizing that there was some competition and the roosters were all crowing and strutting about, but finally things started to settle down.

Bentley decided he was going to be their keeper during the transition and hung out with them for a while.