Esmeralda, our four month old Barred Rock hen, laid her first egg yesterday! OK. I know there are about a gajillion “urban farm” blogs out there announcing the first eggs laid by their sweet backyard hens. But how could I not mention ours? It is SO beautiful. So pink and speckled and small.
Claire thought it particularly wonderful that Esmeralda's first egg arrived on her first day of school. In honor of that little excitement, here they are together--egg and pleated school uniform skirt.
You raise chicks, build them a coop, and then all of a sudden they actually lay eggs. I know it is the most common of biological occurrences, but it still strikes me as improbable, and wonderful, and even miraculous.
Thank you, Esmeralda!
kate // Sep 2, 2009 at 9:59 AM
Love the egg on plaid!
lyanda // Sep 2, 2009 at 10:03 AM
Egg-on-Plaid: the new black.
Tim // Sep 2, 2009 at 10:38 AM
Be sure to guard your chickens. Critters ate all of ours. It was a sad day.
lyanda // Sep 2, 2009 at 10:44 AM
Thanks Tim. Yes, urban chicken-keeping requires great vigilance. We lost chickens in earlier flocks to both raccoons and feral ferrets. We spent a lot of time designing our new coop to be a veritable Chicken Guantanamo, and we’ll post our coop plans in downloadable format in the near future.
Nancy Stillger // Sep 2, 2009 at 11:31 AM
Hooray! I wish my neighbors would read the “gajillion” urban farm blogs… oh well. We keep on keeping on!
Merry Wilson // Sep 2, 2009 at 1:34 PM
What a charming story and sweet photos! I just finished CROW PLANET and feel like I know Claire. : )
I felt the same excitement of ‘first egg days’ when I was raising parakeets and cockatiels. I could never sell any of them…gave a few away, which caused me horrible sorrow. All of my precious flock has passed away, but their memories are forever in my heart.
kort // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:48 PM
nice work, girls!
Birdsong // Sep 7, 2009 at 3:20 PM
Lovely photo! I felt just as excited when the latest batch of pullets began laying as I did when the first ones I raised had… now, I’m giving eggs away because we can’t eat them fast enough:) We did a similar job on our coop, event to trenching around it and laying in rubble to discourage diggers; would love to allow greater ranging, but it would be a death sentence where we live. I am looking forward to seeing your plans.
June // Sep 14, 2009 at 1:34 PM
Every first egg is a sensation and should be celebrated. Congratulations! We’d post about all of ours if we could. They are such beautiful, whole, elegant things.