Chicken Tandoori?

We have had this patio burner for over 8 years and it has cracked to the extent that it's just about unusable. It's held together by wire. It stood on the patio between the run and the grassy area so the indomitable Topaz has explored it several times, getting covered in wood ash as a result. Yesterday Himself cleaned it out, saving the ash for the garden, and filled the base with straw. After capping it with a tray of gravel to keep the rain out, it fetched up in the corner of the run. Topaz was naturally first in, and since then 1 or 2 at a time venture in for a little sit down.

This lunchtime we got back from the allotment with some greens for them and while I was in the run, Ruby went in and settled down. Topaz had to come and see what was going on, of course!

Ruby sat there like a good'un. Was I encouraging them to go broody I wondered? I went indoors to make sandwiches and a loud Birth Announcement (" I laid an EEEEGGGGG!") got me dashing outside to find a lovely warm egg on the straw. We had 3 this morning as against our usual 4 - no problem - we get a 3 egg day about every fortnight - but this was a surprise. Very comfy nest, obviously.