Sunshine on my Shoulders

Another week, another country...

I feel less guilty about leaving the gorgeous one as he has the girls to concentrate on and to occupy his time! But, as I'm not home right now, it's very difficult for me to give you a true and/or full update on how they are and what they've been up to.

So what I'll have to do is share a couple of pictures I took of the girls sunbathing last week and not tell you about the carpet of poo I cleared up from their run on Sunday (2 bags worth). Oh, I wasn't going to tell you that was I?

Sorry.

Anyway, here are the pictures as promised.

Speak soon!

You've got a friend

The gorgeous one is cleaning out the girls as we speak and he just had a little bit of a row with one of them as he needed to get them away from the house to hose it out and one of them wanted to be in the run. I could see him trying to reason with her to get her to leave the run! It won't work, you know, they won't be reasoned with. When you want them in the run, they want to stay out and when you want them out, they want to go in!

They're following him round the garden as well, although they still don't want him to stroke them (Omelette especially). Must be because he gave them a treat this morning, even if it was unintentional, I'll explain. There was a moth in the kitchen this morning so, friend to all animals, the gorgeous one, picked it up and chucked it out the back door. It flew for a bit, landed and was promptly eaten by one of the chickens. Not very friendly that, he's now insisting that the girls are murderers. It's true actually, they chase butterflies and flies round the garden trying to eat them!

Omelette and Yoko have more new feather growth which is good as Omelette still looks like we brought her back from the battery farm yesterday and it's such a contrast to Mabel who is just beautiful. Yoko has lots of the new feather growth too which is good and hopefully they will both catch up to Mabel. Omelette is still worrying us slightly as her eggs are not really forming their shells as they should. The gorgeous one is going to look into what else we can do, specifically to help her. they already have a mineral added to their food to help strengthen their shells and it seems to be working with Mabel and Yoko (who produce just lovely eggs). I think we need something we can give to Omelette directly that's a bit more concentrated. I feel another internet search coming on! She's laid another one like that again today.

At the weekend the girls got a new friend, this new friend was very happy to follow in their footsteps and gather all the leftovers and small bits of loveliness that they dug up and missed. Their new friend even came over to their house and hopped around a bit, it looked very funny actually as their new friend was a Robin! It was a little odd actually as the girls are normally a bit funny about birds in their space and when we had cherries on the floor they wouldn't let anything else near them!

Anyway, they have a nice treat and are out all day today and they will be again on Friday. They do believe it's their god given right now, they have forgotten completely that they only used to have a tiny bit of room which they used to share with four other chickens. Everyone should adopt a chicken or at least stop buying battery eggs.

Walk like a man

Hey there chicken fans

Updating you live from the garden - okay, well the house but I can see the garden!

I know that there has been a big gap in the lives of you all which I am now going to fill with Chickens!!!!! As an apology for this you will get an update picture of the three of them!

This summer we have been infiltrated by some MASSIVE spiders - they seem to be hiding in the drying washing for some reason, and when I say massive I mean HUGE! Now neither myself or the gorgeous one like spiders very much but I haven't been as brave as my lovely man as he has been catching them under glasses and bits of paper. This has made me big happy as they are too huge to just be left, this has also made the girls big happy as he has been feeding the spiders to them! They are big juicy spiders but they don't stand a chance against 3 hungry hens and they do love their bugs!

Not only are we keeping chickens in our garden, but I have been growing vegetables in pots at the bottom of the garden (protected from the chickens). I have been growing parsnips, beetroot, carrots and cucumbers. It's my first time growing anything and I was super excited when green shoots appeared in the tubs! Well, with a busy life, they maybe haven't had as much attention as they should have had and so the harvest has not been the greatest in the world. BUT, I have had carrots, admittedly very small carrots but carrots nonetheless. Well, when I was pulling them out of the tubs on Sunday, there were certain girls who were incredibly interested in what I was doing but when offered carrots fresh from the earth they pecked at them and then walked off. These chickens don't like carrots then. Do chickens like carrots usually?

Omelette, our comedy chicken, has started to do this move every now and again. It reminds me of Louis Spence doing one of his over the top dance moves. She stretches out her wing and the leg on the same side goes stretching out behind her and it just looks very funny and a little bit strange (well, that's Louis Spence for you isn't it?).

On Sunday we had a little (!) gathering to celebrate the girl child's (and mine) birthday so we had a few people over. The gorgeous one wanted to put music on in the kitchen and so he wanted to keep the door open, I kept telling him that he had to keep an eye on the girls then as they do think they should be allowed to go wherever they like (including the house). Well, he wasn't paying all that close attention and Mabel got in the kitchen and made it as far as the fridge! Now I don't mean she stopped when she got to the fridge for a snack, I mean she got that far before the gorgeous one stopped her!

They do like it when we have a lot of people over and they're not at all worried by anyone. I think they know that there will be crumbs or little bits of dropped foods so they're quite happy to hang about, wander round, socialise with everyone - it's lovely to see.

The girls are at various stages in growing back feathers and looking lovely, Mabel is ahead of them all, with a full plumage of lovely new feathers. Yoko is middling with some nice new feathers but still has straggly wings and Omelette, well she looks like she came from the Battery Farm yesterday! Bless her.

Anyway, sorry for the long drag between blogs, I'll try and keep you better informed next time, so until then I'll be clucking off now!!!!!

Steal my sunshine

Once again, I am a roving reporter, coming to you live (well kind of) from Berlin.

Have I told you that the chickens are stupid? Did I explain that they thought it was sensible to stand out in the rain? On Saturday it was nice for a bit in the morning so we let the girls out for a bit of a run around as they hadn't had much time out during the week (mostly due to the gorgeous one being out and about and partly due to the diabolical weather we've had since August hit). One minute it was sunny and the next it was raining, instead of taking shelter in their run or under their house our chickens think they can just stay out and what? Do they believe that they are the chicken exceptions and are the only ones that are water proof? Who knows? The gorgeous one made a bit of a shelter under the tree out of a cardboard box and two of them used that - guess which one didn't? It was very amusing later on to see her spreading herself out on the decking with her leg out and her wings wide to try and dry herself off in the sunshine (when it did make an appearance).

We also have moved their house and run to the other side of the garden and turned it round so that the door on the side (with the window in it) now faces the house (our house). We had to pick up the house (theirs not ours) and move it and I didn't quite have my fingers under it fully so when we were nearly in position my fingers slipped out from under it and it bashed me on the head - ouch! It also bashed the gorgeous one on the shoulder but I was more concerned with my head I must say. You can also now see that the girls are looking out of the window of the door when going to let them out in the morning!

The gorgeous one wanted to make sure I mentioned that he watched Yoko lay her egg on Saturday too. He was cleaning out their house (as he does at the weekend) and had taken it apart to give it a really good clean (again as he does at the weekend). The nesting boxes are not really accessible to the girls during this time as the perching area comes out and just leaves a gap. Luckily, the gorgeous one was outside and noticed that Yoko was getting a bit agitated so lifted her into the nesting boxes where she proceeded to settle down and lay and egg. He did show it to me and was very excited about just how fresh it was! He put a Y on it so we know it was Yoko's (aah).

He has also become obsessed with our fly trap. Whenever you have animals (and masses of poo) you get flies, obvious right? Well, the gorgeous one has found this fantastic fly trap which has kept the flies well away from the run (and they were getting to be a bit of a problem) by luring them into the trap and drowning them in this disgusting liquid. Anyone who has chickens should invest in one of these things although they are supposed to last 12 weeks and ours is nearly full after only two and a half. They also stink but that smell wasn't a patch on my cab driver this morning!!!!

I cant stand the rain

Another week, another business trip.

We had a turn in the weather this week with torrential rain on Tuesday, pretty much all day. Now, try as we might to tell the girls that they aren't waterproof, there's one of them who is either too stubborn or too stupid (you decide) to realise this and will stand out in the rain getting herself well and truly waterlogged. There are no prizes for guessing which one of the girls I'm talking about - I think we all know by now!

This then creates worry and concern for us because she's so waterlogged she cant get up the ramp to go into the bed area. We had been out for the evening and when the gorgeous one came and told me that Omelette wouldn't go in the house and I made him go back out in the dark and pick her up and forcibly put her in the house. Well she had to dry out somehow!

I left very early on Wednesday morning (another flight at stupid o'clock) but the gorgeous one was reporting to me regularly on how she was doing, which wasn't so good. She slid down the ramp in the morning when he opened the door but had a drink and pecked around at something to eat too, which he took as a good sign. When he let them out in the evening she was walking funny like her legs didn't want to work for her, but she does seem much better now - thank goodness.

The girls are out now pecking around in the garden, it's so much harder when the weather is bad to give them a good run out but the gorgeous one got up early this morning to let them out as he felt so guilty about them not being able to be out because of the rain (not exactly his fault is it?). They're going to have a good clean out today and he's going to treat them to some mealworms as they haven't had any of them for a while either. Spoiled chickens!

Laughter in the rain

Fear not chicken fans, Omelette is doing much better now. I was really worried about her for a while as on Tuesday night she actually took to her bed! She was the first in the house and that is not like her at all.

Luckily when the gorgeous one went to them on Wednesday morning she seemed much better and when I let them out yesterday morning (I had a dentist appt) she was back to her usual nutty self - PHEW!!!! I can tell you that the gorgeous one and I were not looking forward to a trip to the vets with her I can tell you, not only from a cost perspective! Putting them away again was a bit tricky as they don't like to be put to bed, rather to go to bed by themselves, when they feel like it. I managed to con Omelette and Yoko back into the house with some bread (give them food and they'll pretty much do whatever you want them to), but Mabel wasn't having any of it. In the end I had to con her with the mealworm tray and when she looked in to grab some juicy loveliness I grabbed her and put her back in the house, much to her dismay!

Today the girls had a bit of a panic when a helicopter flew overhead quite low and they ran for cover. Mabel ran in their house and Omelette and Yoko ran under the swing chair on the deck. It was quite funny, I'm not sure they knew what it was and I'm certain that they thought it was coming to get them! They also remained out while it was raining, I'll have to tell them (again) that they aren't waterproof and that they'll end up waterlogged if they're not careful!

Mabel still has the lump on her wattle so I'll have to do some investigative work on the internet and find out whether there is a reason for this to happen or whether it's something we need to be concerned about. It doesn't seem to be bothering her at all so we'll not worry just yet about it. I did notice that Omelette has a little bald patch on her back and I'm not sure how that's happened, have to keep an eye on that too. My word these girls are hard work!!!!

Every step you take, I'll be watching you

I'm a little worried about the girls.

Yesterday, Omelette was a little lethargic, she was sleeping a lot and generally being very quiet, every time I looked at her she had drawn her neck in and was sleeping where she stood. Then she went into the house for AGES, I checked on her a couple of times and she seemed okay, then when she left the house there was a HUGE egg. The gorgeous one said that it was quite often a sign of brewing a big egg but she was doing it later on last night too. The others weren't "hanging out" with her either and that's apparently not a good sign, perhaps she's sickening for something - I do hope not.

Mabel also has a swelling on her wattle, it looks like she's got a gob stopper in her mouth, but it doesn't seem to be bothering her, I hope it's something that will go away soon and that it's not contagious!

Add to that, the Charlie fox was back again this morning in next door's garden and that all adds up to a big old worry-fest. Sophie always get a little more nervy when the fox is around too (yes, even more nervy than usual) so it's upsetting everyone. I know how much some people hate them, I know that given half the chance they would eat all the girls, including Sophie and I know that there are some people that truly believe they are vermin, but I have to say that the fox next door is incredibly beautiful. He's just a young-un and has lovely red fur and black ears.

There was a very funny moment in the garden yesterday. I had been to the bottom of the garden, the girls were out and I walked slowly towards the house. I stopped by the decking and turned around to find that all three of the hens had followed me and were standing behind me, it's like we were playing that game, you know the one you play when you're little when someone stands facing the other way and you have to creep up on them and if they turn around and see you move you have to go back to the start. The gorgeous one says it's called "Peep around the Corner" but I don't remember calling it that when I was little!

Well I have to go now and we'll just have to keep an extra special eye on the girls (all four of them) and make sure they stay well and protected from Charlie fox.