Episode 16: Silkie City

Last week, a smaller coop and run arrived on the farm.

Not as large as the White House.

Not as large as the Red House.

Finished on the outside.

Still empty inside.

The floor is waiting for sand.

Water lines are measured but not yet installed.

The feeder will go in once placement is finalized.

By spring, it will be fully operational.

In practical terms, it is being prepared for the brooder council. When they feather out — no longer fragile, but still too small and too young to enter the adult houses — they will need space to grow into themselves. A place to learn roost spacing and feeder order before stepping into established hierarchy.

That is the logistical reason it exists.

But that is not the only reason.

Tum-Tum Tillie and Bea Arthur are currently my only two silkies on the farm.

Silkies are bantam chickens — smaller, softer-feathered, and less inclined to push their way through a crowd. They live well in the White House among standard breeds with heavier bodies and quicker movement. No one is unkind. But when you are small in a standard world, you are often underfoot.

They manage it beautifully.

Still, I wanted them to have a place designed where they can live their truest lives.

Tum-Tum & Bea had to come inside when temperatures went below zero.

The new structure is proportioned differently.

Lower thresholds.

Shorter run.

Feeders that won’t require stretching.

Water that won’t require standing on tiptoe.

From the White House windows, they can see it clearly.

In daylight, it is simply a smaller coop I am preparing.

In the dark, it glows.

They call it Silkie City.

I did not name it.

That belongs to them.

Inside the White House, life continues as it always does.

Khloe watches everything.

Beryl inspects for structural damage and voices concerns. The larger hens continue to govern in their established rhythm.

And in the corner — slightly out of the traffic pattern — sit Tum-Tum and Bea.

Close together.

Quiet.

Watching.

Across the yard, the smaller house evolves a little more each evening as I work.

I am installing sand.

They are looking at something beautiful.

By spring, it will be ready.

What it becomes after that will unfold on its own.

Bea Arthur and Tum-Tum Tillie wait together for warmer weather.