The Adventures of Kari and Whitney...

Maybe you remember a post from back in April, where I lost my chickens to a fox...

Since then, our neighbor gave us two leghorn hens that she hatched in her animal science class at CTC.  She transported them in a cat carrier, they were that small, at only 8 weeks of age...

I named them Kari and Whitney, after her mom and aunt.  :)  Just for fun!

While I tried to figure out how to fortify the chicken pen and make it fox-proof, I penned them inside the shed with screens over the doors.  They still got lots of light, ventilation, and had plenty of room to explore. 

They were quite timid at first, and hid under the nesting boxes whenever I would come around.  They learned to flutter up and climb inside the nesting boxes to sleep. Sometimes I would find them huddled together in one box...

They're now about 14 weeks old, growing fast, and becoming braver.  They've begun venturing outside in search of bugs, grass and whatever chickens find to eat.  They also enjoy the watermelon and cantelope rinds that I've been putting in their pen.  Today the two of them devoured the rind of a watermelon in just a few hours!  If they keep eating like they are, and growing, in about 6 or 7 weeks, we should find some eggs!  It's going to look kind of strange to see white eggs...we've only ever had brown chickens and brown eggs.  Hopefully later this summer, we'll add a few more chickens...

Tonight when I mowed inside the pen, they actually stayed outside, and only ran inside when Phoebe barked at them.  (She would love to eat them, so we have to be super diligent to see that she never gets inside the pen!)

I snagged a huge pile of (free!) discarded fence posts and rails from the golf course across the road that is doing a lot of renovations, and lined the inside of the fence, in hopes that it will deter unwanted  critters, aka foxes, from getting inside...

The next thing is to catch the groundhog that has dug a hole underneath the shed.  There's always something!