Coop Chaos & Duck Drama

Chickens are often referred to as the gateway animal for homesteads. Which for us, was sort of true- we had our eyes on cattle from day 1. But we technically started our farm journey with a small flock of 6 hens and today, I couldn't tell you how many hens we have. Chickens are great and for the most part they are the easiest animal to care for on our farm. But this summer our flock gave us a lot of headaches and heartburn. I shared back in the spring about our Mama Hen Drama, our flock nearly doubled after a few surprise hatches. The worst part was that we had 12 roosters born this spring! If you know anything about roosters, you don't want that many roaming your farm. For months I have been trying to find time to deal with our rooster problem. Well we finally had a day to do it. I can happily announce that our farm is now back to an acceptable rooster quota of one. Big Red has gracious accepted his position as flock leader and we are all very grateful not to be constantly surrounded by crow battles and rooster fights. The hens are also much happier not being chased around by all the roosters.

Our next task is to relocate the 20 hens who have decided the barn is a more suitable coop than the actual coop we have built for them. In my dream world, our barn would be free of chicken poop and random egg stashes, but I suppose we will have to wait for the one random day that we both have off work and can tag team this relocation effort. Anyone looking for hens?

Oh and if you thought the fun stopped there, nope. The ducks also gave us a summer to remember. As I have shared before we had one flock that decided it no longer wanted a single leader. They decided to split and declare war on each other. Everyday I would break up fights between the mob bosses of each flock. We even had to create two separate duck enclosure until we could find a viable solution for peace among the duck nations. Then came the predator issues. We lost 10 ducks this summer to owls, possums, and an unknown predator. We reinforced their coop several times and set out traps. We caught an absurd amount of possums. I had no idea that possums actually ate ducks... but they do and they left a disgusting mess behind. Once we got the predator issue managed we were back to managing the ongoing battles between the dwindling flocks. We made it work, until one of the flocks decided they wanted to wander into the road in front of our property. At first I didn't think it would be a repeat issue but after a few days of hearing car horns and hoping no ducks had caused an accident, I decided it was time to intervene.

That evening after the ducks had put themselves to bed, I decided to combine the flocks and make them like each other. I moved the smaller flock into the big enclosure and made sure each had their own safe space. (two separate houses). For several weeks I did not allow the ducks out of their run. They had to learn to get along and share their space. It went surprisingly well. I expected there to be weeks of fighting, but we had maybe 2 days of little battles. To my relief, they have made their peace and are now enjoying life together. I still do not allow them to free range the whole farm but I do hope that we can expand their space in the future. For now they have a huge pond, a cozy home, and plenty of space to dig up those bugs.

Despite the flock drama, they still bring me so much joy. Especially now that I am not breaking up mob fights, protecting hens from feisty roosters, and the noise... y'all that alone is amazing! It's been a trying year for our flocks but I'm reminded that even the hard seasons on the farm have purpose. There's always something to learn, something to laugh about later, and always a reason to be thankful. Life on the farm is never dull- and I wouldn't trade it for anything.

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