Introducing Baby Mouse. You may remember her as this little thing ...
Baby Mouse has achieved full grown hen status and started laying eggs for me a few weeks ago. I'm using the term "for me" very loosely here, because the closest she's ever come to doing anything for me is when she very much on purpose, tried to pluck my left eye out. Repeatedly. After jumping in my lap for attention. She's kindda out of left field that way. She'd make a terrible service animal. For one thing you may start off with a mere anxiety disorder when you get her but you'd end up missing 2 eyes, part of an ear, definitely some soft cartilage and suffer from PTSD.
She sure lays some pretty eggs though.
And luckily, I can still see them. A few more lap dances from her and you'll have to describe them to me by pressing your finger into the palm of my hand and drawing them.
Yeah. You can see the danger in her eyes.
Baby Mouse is what's called an Olive Egger. It isn't a breed per say, so much as a mix of 2 breeds that have unique qualities. One of its parents is a dark egg layer and one of its parents is a blue egg layer. Put them together in a motel room with a heart shaped nest and what you end up with are a bunch of little chickens that will eventually lays olive coloured eggs. It's all basic colour wheel stuff.
Baby Mouse comes from Ameraucana (blue egg laying) lines and Copper Marans (dark, dark brown egg laying) lines.
Which means I now have hens in my coop that lay dark brown, blueish/green, bright blue and olive coloured eggs. They're produced by my Easter Egger, Cheez Whiz, who lays blueish/green eggs, my Copper Marans, Mabel and Josephine who lay dark brown eggs, Sweetie who lays bright blue eggs and now Baby Mouse who lays her olive coloured eggs.
Not pictured are the eggs from Sweetie who has gone on egg laying strike; a very common affliction for hens in winter. I'm not entirely sure of the science behind it but basically hens who don't lay eggs throughout the winter stay here in Canada while their ovaries take off to play horseshoes in Palm Beach.
Baby Mouse. The man eating chicken. Such poetic irony for such a pea brained animal.
And such a big breast if she ever tries to blind me again.
Gorgeous animal. I'm sure she was pricy, too, I hope she doesn't become the most expensive chicken soup you've ever tasted... but no taking chances with the eyes.
"A few more lap dances from her and you’ll have to describe them to me by pressing your finger into the palm of my hand and drawing them."
That line gave me a good laugh this morning. Thank you. Off to make bath bombs...
Merry Christmaskahwanzaa!
We haven't seen a "Will They Eat It" segment in awhile... Those crack me up (haha)!
she's beautiful! one of my new girls just started laying last week. at least i think it was last week. i found a clutch of 8 eggs in the corner of the coop. on the floor. there are 3 nesting boxes, but clarice likes the floor :/ she's part americauna. beautiful greenish blue eggs. gretel's are more blue. i'm looking forward to seeing hattie's eggs. i think she may have some marans in her. merry christmas karen :)
Thanks Cary, Merry Christmas to you too! ~ karen
That is the dressed-up face of a VELOCIRAPTOR!
Yep. ~ karen!
She looks delicious....(jk)
And here I thought we were rainbow sparkle friends. ;) ~ karen!
Of course we are kidoh. I was just kidding about delicious. What I meant is she really is a beautiful chicken. Almost as pretty as her Mama Karen. I hope you all have the best Christmas and New Year holidays. I love the new built-in bookshelves and the holiday house tour. You're my #1 !!! (hugs)
Yay! A chicken update...How are the lavender chickens? Or were they all boys?
This is one of them, lol. They were never lavender though. They were all splash Olive Eggers with some of them having a hint of blue when they were young. Baby is actually one of those actually. Splash is a colour that's basically white with random grey speckles on them. I sold all the others; boys and girls, and kept only one. Baby. :) ~ karen!
Yeah the eye thing... she IS after all a tiny dinosaur.
Just had to comment because the lap dance/Helen Keller reference was a belly laugh for me. Awesome, thank you. Totally caught me off guard, although I should expect that caliber of sarcasm/dark humor by now. :)
Thanks Molly! You may have been the only one to get that reference. So I'm VERY happy you appreciated it, lol. ~ karen!
So happy to hear your baby is laying. I have been waiting not very patiently to hear when and what colour when she started. My two are both laying green/olive but not prettily speckled like yours. They just started a week ago, and they were hatched shortly before yours so I knew it had to be soooon.
She looks a lot like one of my hens - an orphan chick, who is the BEST mother, a quite small hen but she lays big eggs and raised two clutches of chicks this year. Also, stubborn, ornery, full of attitude, bossy and delightful.
Well, she is gorgeous. So OF COURSE she's kind of a bitch.
Beautiful photos, Karen
I like her colouring. I used to work in the Canadian arctic, and we had ptarmigans running around all over that look like this in the winter. We used to call them ptundra chickens.
Love those egg colors!!
She's very beautiful! I agree about the eyes, lol, crazy eyes. Idk I feel like a lot of birds could snap at any moment. I imagine dinosaurs had a smiliar thing going for them, lol.
Are you aware of the Hot Crazy Scale?
She is only that crazy because she is such a looker! or because she is a looker she is that crazy.. Not sure which comes first.
Since she uses red eye shadow all around her eyes, I'd say she is going for an evil look - maybe take her make-up away. Her eggs are gorgeous! I'm so envious of your colorful basket of eggs - not your fantastic hair, nor trim and fit body, not get-er-done attitude, but your eggs! When my daughter was 4, she couldn't wait to show her Grandpa our newest hatch of chicks. She took his hand and led him to the cage and sweetly smiled up at him and said "They have long peckers but it doesn't hurt." We all had to bite our tongue to keep from laughing cause you know kids, they repeat what gets a reaction.
It's that long very pointy thing on the front of her face that worries me!
And by "her", I mean the chicken . . . lol . . . ?
IN my best cockney accent : "She's a bird! What, eh!"
I'm testing things out here to see if the page scrolling while commenting issue happens for me as well!