P2 is a private farm and sanctuary for non-threatening, Florida woodland animals. We're surrounded by the sound of construction and loss of natural habitat for birds, reptiles and creatures of all sort. Our goal is to provide a natural habitat for them to find respite amid the changing landscape and share the journey with you.
Tomorrow, January 1st, 2023, Mary and I begin our 15th year together exploring the world and all the beauty it has to offer.
We are so blessed, with 33 beautiful little chicken friends and all sorts of Florida wildlife, we love you all, even the gators.
But by far the single greatest thing we share is LOVE. We've both experienced not having love in our lives and having it is A LOT BETTER than being alone.
Before we met we were orbiting without a mission. Finally, we're complete. Our final temporary destination is known.
Thursday Morning, dealing with tarps in 7-24mph wind LOL
Hurricane Nicole came to visit us in mid November. She began to show herself on Wednesday Nov 9th during the day light hours, the wind was picking up and we had some rain off and on. I was out on the driveway a lot mounting a couple of video cameras so we can see cars coming and going and keep an eye on things from the safety of the P2 Master Control Room (aka kitchen). When we went to bed around 9PM we were having 6mph wind according to our West weather station.
Farrrrrrrrm Living is the life for me! Chickens are now a big part of our lives here at P2. Every morning we get them out of their houses and get them ready for a day of play.
Meet Anhinga, she's an amazing bird that flies magnificently, has claws to help her sleep in trees and she swims underwater, impaling fish on her spear-like beak before swallowing them whole on the shore of our private Florida lake.
Mary spotted this little guy sunning himself on the western shore of our pond this morning. Eight peafowl were checking him out (I had to look away because I was afraid one of our Pea-Friends was going to get chomped). Fortunately no pea's were injured. He was avoiding having his picture taken.
It seems like just last week the box of day-old white Silkie hens arrived here and now they're almost totally grown up.
One of the little fluff balls laid her first egg today. There have been egg songs coming from their coop and we've been checking for eggs but this is the first time we've actually got an egg.
The Lord called her home, our little bantam chicken named "Blue" has left the Earth behind and headed to a better place. We will always remember you Blue, peace be with you.
We ordered some food to be delivered from Walmart and the driver left everything on the sidewalk, significantly short of the front door. We were initially confused and infuriated but after we reviewed the attached "delivery confirmation" photo we understood what had happened.
Male Peacock Intimidates Delivery Driver
Our trained "Guard Peacock" was on duty, pacing back and forth, patrolling the front door area and keeping us safe from intruders.
We had this years first baby peacocks appear early July... two of them. They have quickly learned to come to the P2 buffet every morning and get sunflower seeds, corn, and cabbage treats :D
UPDATE: The coops have been renumbered, to make them more orderly, progressing from one through seven in physical order. The renumbering makes this post difficult to understand. We have tested "Frizzle" with various hens but ultimately we bought him three ISA standard size hens, Iris, Sparkle and Angel.
Little Tom and Marilyn moved in with Dusty and company.
Fritz did turn out to be very lucky getting his three ladies to keep an eye on and look after. Dusty ended up with the single largest flock. Read on to discover more.
Here they are, it's the Powder Puff gang. Things were several things I noticed this week. In spite of having no relationship these little hens are forming a family. When one is not there they begin peeping.
If you feel the neck on one of these babies, underneath all that fluff their real neck is only about 1/4" in diameter, it's really small.
These little puffs weigh almost nothing. Every night I put them to bed, one by one so I get to feel them at least once a day and they are so light and fluffy, it's amazing.
These little birds still like to be under their heat lamp. Third week of age means they can tolerate 85 degrees Fahrenheit.
On Monday, the first day of her third week of life little "Boo" flew out of the coop. Mary heard some loud peeping out on the porch and we went out to find Boo cowering in a corner, terrified.
The babies have now had two different outings to the atrium garden. The first time they just huddled together and said "W O W".
On their second outing the baby puffs decided to "dust bathe". Two weeks plus one day old with zero instruction, they love dust bathing.
Their little wings are coming out fast and furious. The silkies are not good fliers at all but Boo is proving she can get some air.
On their first outing the little hens got tired after about 10 minutes away from the brooder box.
On their second outing the hens had a blast licking plant leaves, tugging on blades of grass and having a little bath in the rich Florida sandy gravel and muck.
Our latest little flock is growing like weeds, they're more than double their original size when they arrived here just over two weeks ago.
On an old tree stump, I discovered a fun new fungus or mushroom... and I can't identify it. It looks like white potato chips. It seems that every year or so we have a new fungus appear (likely from spores from years ago). A few years ago it was dog vomit everywhere on mulch. Then it was years of stink weed (ewwwwww). And now, potato chips :D
These pictures are from August 2021 when we had the "Lovebirds" on the porch. We had separated them from the rest of Flock 2 when they were getting picked on. This separation was a prelude to them getting paired with Frizzle (he loves them SO MUCH).
This glamour photo shoot wasn't here on the blog yet, so here it is. They are SO GORGEOUS!
We were not expecting this to happen until the first of August. In our kitchen sipping coffee and watching the day unfold, then, all of a sudden, they stormed the place, BABY PEAFOWL!
I did what anyone would do, I grabbed my phone and started shooting video of them.
(SIX) DAY-OLD WHITE SILKIE HENS AND ONE DAY-OLD BELGIAN BLUE
We ordered this group of hens back around the beginning of May but had to wait for them to hatch. The one Belgian Blue is a replacement for a dud we received in our previous order (nuff said 'bout that).
They came out of their eggs Sunday June 5th, got shoved in a box Monday June 6th and shipped Overnight from Myer Hatchery in Cleveland Ohio to us in Melbourne Florida. We got a call Tuesday morning around 11am from the West Melbourne Post Office. The lady on the phone was super-excited to tell us our baby chickens had arrived. We leaped into action and in less than half an hour the new babies were at P2 and relaxing in their new suite (aka Brooder Box).
We put the brooder together the previous Friday so we'd have everything in readiness for the new girls to arrive. Here is the unboxing, thankfully everyone arrived ALIVE!
We've been shooting videos and photos as fast as we can because these little girls will grow so fast. Just two days out of the egg the little Belgian Blue is already showing wing tip feathers. At four days old they'll be double their original size.
The egg in one of the videos is just for size reference, this is a Bantam chicken egg, approximately the same size egg our birds came from.
The new babies were so glad to finally be home. It's traumatic to come out of your egg and jump on an overnight flight, they were exhausted and napped frequently Tuesday afternoon. We put them to bed around 8pm Tuesday night and they all slept for 12-hours straight.
BANTAM EGG SHOWN FOR SIZE REFERENCE ONLY
We had stormy weather on Wednesday and were swarming in wild Peafowl when I was shooting videos and photos. The new babies seemed unfazed by the thunder, Peafowl and various rooster calls in the air. The peeping from baby chickens is so sweet and this time of their life passes all too quickly. They go from peeping to their quiet "chortling" conversations very quickly.
BANTAM EGG SHOWN FOR SIZE REFERENCE ONLY
PUFFS UP CLOSE
SOUND EFFECTS BY GOD!
MORE UP CLOSE AND PEEPY!
Notice how she likes being petted on the chest, even with thunderous storm in the background
PHOTOS FROM DAY ONE, TWO AND THREE
The box that brought "Teeny Hens" to P2
Naps Happen, they're walking along then, BAM, blacked out, tired
Is this OK?
More napping
Wholesale mid afternoon blackout nap (learned it from me ;-)
Under the warmth of the heat lamp, 95-105 degrees F depending on Variac setting
MEET "BOO" OUR NEW BELGIAN BLUE
Feathered feet, how cute is that?
"Boo" is the only Belgian Blue in this batch of hens
Boo will turn more lavender colored as she gets older and feathers-out, for now her little light colored beak and feet are her biggest visual clues about her difference from the other six. In Boo's eyes she's a Silkie ;-)
MEET "BLUE-GREEN", temp name lol
"P E E P !"
What a cute face. Only three days old and already looking like a star.
GLAMOUR SHOT, BLUE-GREEN :-)
THURSDAY JUNE 9TH
It's now their third day at P2, everyone has figured out the feeding dish and the water bowl. At first we had a little trouble getting them to drink but they figured it out (like all their kin that were here before them).
All the baby hens got up around 8am. They sleep in a heap under a "Mama Hen" brooder heater at night, it's a comfy chicken baby temperature of 99-degrees F under the heater. We took turns checking on the babies every 3-to-4 hours during the night just to make sure nobody staggered out, got lost and could not find their way back to the warm spot. No problems, these hens love to sleep.
DYED CHICKENS
Today, we experimented with putting food coloring on wing tips of three of the Teeny Silkies. Thus:
Green-Left, Green-Right, and Blue-Green were named temporarily. We'll watch to see how the food coloring holds up as the little peeps feather-out.
BEDTIME FOR BABY CHICKENS
I love putting the babies to bed at night. I turn off their red heat lamp and one by one put the babies under the heater. Of course one or two run back out but after several tries they realize the heat is where I'm putting them and eventually they stay in their sleeping area. In about 5-minutes the babies go from awake running all over to under Mama-hen heater, blacked out.
To get the babies to stay under the brooder heater we need to reduce the red heat lamp to minimum (chicks love red). With the light this low it's difficult to shoot video but iPhone captured the event of putting the tiny hens to bed for the night. After the camera stopped it took about 10 seconds for all peeping to cease, the group blacked out. They were suddenly in pre-warmed chip fluff with the 100 degree heat coming off the heater plate above them. It's the perfect place for teeny baby hens to spend the night dreaming of chicken stuff.
After weeks of waiting for parts to arrive we finally moved ahead and built our best chicken world yet, DUSTYLAND.
It's two 6.6' x 10' aviaries grafted together with a 40" rain space in between. The entire structure is skinned with chicken wire. The bottom 24" has an extra layer of 1/4" x 1/4" in square hardware cloth. The hardware cloth prevents wandering raccoons and other roosters from getting to one of our prized roosters :-)
VIDEO OF BRAND NEW DUSTYLAND AND OUR STAR
IT'S DUSTY OUR WHITE SILKIE ROOSTER
LITTLE TOM
Since it's April, here is another Birthday Star, it's Little Tom, she's one year old and going strong.
That big fluffy guy photobombing Little Toms birthday video shoot is Fritz (aka Frizzle) another of our prize winning roosters. That fluffy little white bearded Silkie hen is Marilyn. It's her birthday too, she came to us a year ago as part of our second Tractor Supply chick days event.
DUSTYLAND DAY ONE PHOTOS
Main entrance door and view of entry ramp into Formex house
Since Dustyland is constructed with two complete aviary kits we have a man door in both ends for convenient human access.
At night we close the door to the coop and secure it with a carabiner.
Closer view of entry ramp, note popsicle sticks glued to board
That big fluffy white rooster is DUSTY! He is a bantam Silkie rooster, complete with blue skin and five toe feet. His soft appearance is even softer when you pet him. He is luxurious.
His size appearance is very misleading. Under all those fluffy white feathers is a little over 1.5 pounds of bird, there's not much there but don't tell him that. His personality is immense, so is his vocabulary. Dusty is constantly talking when he's awake. He greets me I'm the morning "bur-ka burp?". I answer him "buc buc buc", it's chicken speak.
In spite of spending his days digging and scratching in black Florida top soil Dusty is glowing white and spotless. Chickens are dust bathers and we've got plenty of that for him to roll around in.
The standard size hen is Shannon, a Golden Comet. She has a wonderful inquisitive personality and usually lays an egg per day.
We engineered in an extra 40" area for rain to fall inside the aviary. The chickens can get out of the rain under the roof covers or they can go into the coop if things get real scary. Chickens don't like to swim (they sink and drown) but surprisingly they do seem to like and benefit from a little exposure to rain so we added that extra space to Dustyland.
One of our innovations, put the coop outside for easy cleaning
At night we bring the food box feeder OUT of the aviary and put it under that big green plastic flower pot to keep night time visitors from eating our expensive organic chicken feed.
All of our Formex coops are on these custom built leg-base stands
This is the egg access door, it has two hasps secured with carabiners to keep hungry raccoons out. The legs lift the coop up away from ants and crawling bugs. The legs also make it a lot easier to collect eggs and clean out the poop tray (the dark side of chickens lol).
It is difficult to see in the above photo but in the upper right corner is the piece of painted pine board which is there to help water run off the roof canvas and go over the house not right in the front door.
Close view of .25" hardware cloth, comes up 24" from ground for extra protection
Dustyland has a beautiful lake view and a fat perch
Say goodbye to the grass in Dustyland, soon Shannon (Dusty's gal pal) will completely remove every blade of grass and turn it into raw, Florida beach sand.
YOYO is almost a year old, his birthday is the beginning of next month. He came to P2 courtesy of our friends at Tractor Supply Company.
YoYo was a pretty little yellow chick when he was just three days old, now look at him, he's majestic. His bright red comb and wattles contrast beautifully with his white fluffy feathers and amazing yellow beak (he's our only chicken with a yellow beak). His yellow feathers and yellow beak prompted his name when he was just a baby.
He presides over Flock2 where the Minkies and the Buzzies live.
YoYo is a Frizzled Bantam Rooster, in spite of all his fluffiness he weighs less than 2-pounds, there is not a lot of bird under all that fluff.
This little raccoon had a bad night. He's been rampaging our chicken aviary cages, digging his way in questing for food. We don't mind if he visits at night but when he starts invading the chicken play areas then he is only one step away from coming during the daytime and helping himself to a chicken in a most unpleasant manner.
#8 (for short) made a quick escape once he was at his new home.
#9 BABY RACON
This little guy was very daring and would taunt us mercilessly, staying just out of reach but repeatedly coming to eat and rampage the chicken aviary(s), he has a new home in beautiful South Brevard County. His brother is still sneaking around P2, as long as we don't see him in our chicken areas we're cool.
Goodbye Baby Raccoon, another place, another time......
