Digging!

"Do you think we can dig up this damson tree?"

I want HER slug!

A jolly interlude in Chicken Field between the showers on Monday.

Chick Pics

"I wonder why they've netted off those fruit bushes?" Garnet and Topaz survey my attempts to save the Tayberries for us, not them. They don't look well impressed do they?

A little stroll across the patio on the way to Chicken Field. No hurry - there are lots of things to stick your beak in on the way

We all like apple! Roaming around Chicken Field is obviously great fun. However, it is not to be shared if you have a delicate disposition. When a chicken has just found, run away with and fought for possession of a huge black slug, then eaten it with evident relish, she has a smear of sticky slug slime remaining around her beak for ages, getting grass and dirt stuck to it. These chickens grew up in a pen covered in shavings, inside a poly tunnel. No-one fed them slugs. How do they know they can eat them? More to the point, why would they even try in the first place?

Chicken field

We spent several hours on Sunday with old fencing panels, left over weldmesh, stakes and even bamboo canes, producing an area where the chickens can roam safely and scratch at green stuff. Part of the garden contains the vegetables and has to be a no-go if WE are to eat as well as the chickens! Some of the rest contains fox-gloves and other plants I don't think it would be wise to let them munch on.

The area near the camera is fairly grassy - why do they choose the scratty bit with ancient gravel and remains of strimmed comfrey? Topaz and Garnet were test pilots on Sunday evening - to see if we'd missed any obvious problems. To get there they have to cross a patio and gravel path. Every step was punctuated with "Oooh a weed, must peck this!" and "Hey, bit of grass, must beak this!" The journey was longer than anticipated! They have a pop-hole in the fencing to get in and out - we have a bit of a gatey-thing.

We hope to let them have a grassy session fairly regularly while we are there to supervise. This grass run is definitely not predator-proof.

Four eggs a day now. clever little things.