New chippings

The chickens are exploring the new run surface. It's ginger - they are well camouflaged!


Luckily we were around when a tree 4 doors up the road had to be lopped because its upper branches were interfering with the telephone line. The contractor sawed the big branches off and fed them into an industrial chipper. He was happy to dump half his load for the use of the village. We filled a huge sack which had come with a ton of gravel. We also took several barrow loads up to an elderly neighbour to mulch her flower beds. The rest will mulch the village flower beds.

The chickens had their run cleaned out this morning with their old chippings going to mulch our front garden (the woodland bit).

I wanted to take a picture of them rummaging around in the new chippings. We know there were small caterpillars and bugs because we saw some, but they have evidently found much to delight them. Can't seem to catch them with their heads up at the moment!

We have almost half a bag of chippings left too. They are covered over and weighed down because more gales are forecast this afternoon.

Chicken fun!

Autumn clear-up in the vegetable garden.

The chickens were allowed out this afternoon onto the back garden vegetable plot. They raked amongst the annual weeds and the remains of the tomatoes and the sweetcorn and courgette stalks. Then The Man started digging and behold! Worms!

The Man had to hang back a bit to avoid kebabbing a chicken. The Woman took over to give the plot a rough winter digging and pounds of worms were consumed by the feathered ones.

Eventually the intrepid Amber wandered off into the shrubs for a fossick around. She stayed under there grubbing about for 10 minutes or so, until the lure of the worm bonanza brought her back. This was such a successful expedition it might be repeated, but not too often. When they come out of the run now they trot over to their fenced off bit of grass. I don't want them to assume the veg plot is permanently theirs too!

Alleluia!

It's raining seeds!

A rather fuzzy picture taken through the garden room window, shows the chickens enjoying the bits the sparrows drop (or deliberately chuck out!). It's like chicken occupational therapy. They rush up excitedly every time the little birds visit the feeder.

Must clean garden room windows!

Up-tails all!

All four digging around in the dirt. Just what a chicken likes. Amber decides to dig her own bit though.

Scratching about in the ever-fascinating undergrowth. They haven't left much grass here.

Something to scratch in.

After recent high winds the village is full of fallen leaves. I thought the chickies would enjoy a bit more litter to scratch in so after this morning's session with our village In Bloom group, I wandered up the lane with the wheelbarrow and filled it with autumn leaves.

While the ladies were out in their little 'field' I added the leaf litter to their run. When they got back they spent ages trampling it down to crispy bits and scratting in it. A great success, I think. I may go back next week for another barrow load.

Ready for the rain!

The run is now roofed over, ready for the rain. Where is it? I love a bit of good weather but it's over a month since we had even drizzle. Since I took the picture there's also a length of guttering and a water butt. The drying peas in the photo are all harvested for seed or winter use and the soil is like dust. The only beans with green leaves and pods not drying are the True Red Cranberry pole bean which has such a long season it ends up on newspaper on the windowsill. Still, the girls are enjoying windfall damsons (the ones too high to reach even with the steps) and the small sweetcorns too titchy to bother with. They bother!

Eating marrow and playing dead

I used most of an overblown courgette to make a marrow chutney a couple of days ago, and the chickens tackled the remainder. I cut it into slices and they pecked it away from the middle outwards. I expected to find the rinds but they ate them too!

Rather a contrasty shot but all four were nestling in dusty hollows they had gouged. When I came out with the camera, Topaz ran up to see if it was edible, but I've caught the other 3 playing 'dead chickens' on what used to pass for grass!