Baby Elvira enjoying the afternoon light in the Mission

A new member arrived to our jolly chicken. She is called Madge, but we call her Baby Elvira because she looks like Elvira.

Dolores wandering in the jungle in the backyard.

Our chickens seemed to accept the “little sister” well, until there was a fight. A bad fight, over something as trivial as a bread crumb. Baby Elvira got hurt. Actually she got hurt so bad that her eye had to be removed. Just to be clear: a vet did the removal, we didn’t.

The sisters walking to their penthouse coop.

She is pecking along pretty well with only one eye but she looks very confused most of the time. The others, especially Frida, the brown one, are still mocking her.

I feel very sorry. I’m pondering whether I could find a place for here at the Farm where I’m currently studying. But maybe she would feel lonely then, without her family?

The eggs were an award for suggesting names for our chickens. Diana and Jim suggested the name Chiquita, which we chose to be as a name for the smaller yellow chicken.

Diana reports that the Elvira eggs were delicious – actually, the best ones she has ever eaten. She made a potato tortilla out of the eggs. Gourmet eggs, that’s what Elvira’s eggs are.

Namegiver Morales, assistants Lyon, Grace, Marie, Frida the Chicken and me

The House of Eggriculture turned into a party scene last Friday evening. Over 40 people came to celebrate the official namegiving occasion for our chicks. The highlight of the evening was the namegiving ceremony, in which
we had an honor to have the only professional chicken namegiver in the Mission – “Father” Frank Morales to name our chickens, assisted by an international group of children.

See more of the extremely entertaining ceremony in the video below, and find photos on my Flickr stream.

Donna and the first egg

Elvira finally laid her first egg. She must be over her trauma which she got when she was abandoned in the streets of San Francisco.

We are happy about that because now we don’t need to hire a chicken therapist – that would have been financially burdening especially now that Donna got a letter from the San Francisco Office of the Treasurer and Tax Collector.

The letter says Donna has to pay extra fees on the top of her taxes. We don’t like that.

The nasty letter, nice pink though

But the egg made us happy. Donna found the egg in the coop in the afternoon when she came home from work. It is a very small egg, and brown.

We will save it for a while before eating it – but we won’t wash the egg, as they told us in the chicken class not to. That would damage the natural foil that covers the egg. With the natural foil, the egg doesn’t need to be refridgerated either.

May our life be filled with free range, fully organic eggs from now on!

Damn, I just bought a dozen eggs in Trader Joe’s yesterday. And as of now, we will start getting an egg per day from Elvira. An omelette, anyone?

The Egg

Eric and the chickens when they had just arrived.

We chose names for the chicks.

The white chicken is called Elvira, just because the name fits her. She behaves like Elviras do. She is a bit silly, but always curious and polite.

The little brown one is called Frida, after the artist Frida Kahlo. Frida the Chicken, just like Frida the Artist, is extremely brave. She is stunningly fearless: She was he first one to scare the cats away when the chickens first arrived at our home.

The little yellow one is called Chiquita, which is Spanish and means a little girl. Chiquita is also a banana brand, and the chick loves bananas, plus she is yellow like banana.

The bigger yellow one is called Dolores, after the mighty Dolores Huerta. She was a labor leader, and co-founded United Farm Workers, which is a labor union in the States. She worked with Cesar Chavez, another profound labor leader. Maybe Dolores Park was named after Dolores Huerta? Or after another strong woman?

We chose these Latina-related names because we live in the Mission, the Latin soul of San Francisco.

Thank you all for suggesting awesome names. We are rewarding you with free-range, fully organic, happy chicken eggs.

The ones of you who suggested names for our chickens are eligible for the eggs. But, you will have to wait until you redeem your eggs. No sighting of an egg yet.

Ann making friends with one of the chicks.

The chickens, all four of them, have become integral part of our family. Also, they have become great entertainment for the whole neighborhood: always when I glance out of the window to see how the chickens are doing, I see somebody on their balcony looking at the chickens.

We call them only “Girls”. We really need to name them properly; otherwise, they might get an identity crisis as a result of treating them as a group, as a mass.

We want to have your contributions to the process: please, suggest names for our chickens!

Post your suggestions by replying to this post with the form that you’ll find at the bottom of the page. We will gather suggestions for a couple of weeks, and then, from the suggestions, people can vote for their favorite names. The winner names will be chosen – unless the names are super awkward.

In this link you’ll find the profiles of the chickens, with pictures that capture their personalities.

For your inspiration: Here are some names that have already been suggested, by a reader of this blog.

Amelia. Amelia Earhart was a famous aviator.
Thelma and Louise. We all know who they are and they sure did fly.

Hillary Clinton. She’s a bit of a high flyer.(Editor’s note: Suggestion made by a New Zealander, she is not aiming to be offensive)

Martha. As in Stewart. She was kept in the coop for a wee while wasnt she. Poor Martha!!!!!!

HennyPenny. From the story book “Chicken Little” and…

Gertrude. Just a cool chicken name.

What is your suggestion? Remember: we have four chickens, and not a single name – so the more names you’ll suggest, the happier we are! And, if you want to, you can tell us which name goes for which chicken; for example, Lollipop for the white punk chicken, HennyPenny for one of the yellow ones, etc.

The new punk spirited chicken

We got a new chicken. She came from Animal Care and Control, an animal rescue shelter in San Francisco. She had been wondering at the streets downtown, and some nice policemen saved her and gave her a ride to the shelter.

She moved in with us yesterday, just before I went to try out the new restaurant at 18th and Guerrero, Ebb&Flow. She seems to be a bit sad, and is picking and the three baby chickens we have.

Oh, I hope this is not end up to a huge drama. However, this chicken looks super weird: she is a Polish Silky chicken, I was told.

Follow the story in the pictures.

Famous Donna is ready to start the chicken trip in front of our porch. The toy chick in her hand is for inspiration.

Our dog Daisy starting the trip to Sonoma to fetch the chickens. She is suspicious about the plan.

Donna pondering whether we will need another story in the chicken coop. Two-storied-chicken-coop, you know.

In same chicken stores, the chickens are in boxes. We didn't like that. Our chickens need to see light.

Too small for us? We don't want to wait forever until they start laying eggs.

I agree with the poster.

We found another chicken store, called Hay&Grain. The simplicity in the name of the store appealed to us.

This is a place we like. We will get our chickens from here. But what kind of? What colors, types?

Connor caught the chickens for us. Ready to go home!

Ready to go home, chickens. Aren't they cute?