Wednesday, March 17, 2010





Things are silly here in the country! We have had the chickens almost a year now. They have been an entertainment and a delight. We started out with 6 Aracauna hens, lost one to a cruising neighbor dog, and have maintained 5 free ranging chickens over the fall and winter.
Of course, our daughter had to name them: Sophie, Audrey, Gwendlyn, Danielle de Barbaraqe... I'm forgetting one, hmmm.

So the other day I came home from work and was standing on the driveway talking to David. I noticed the dog was laying on the grass , licking something round and light colored..... an egg! with a crack! I snatched it up, looking around to see where he could have found this egg. The girls were supposed to be laying in the hen house, in their nice nesting boxes. No more running off to the woods to lay. No more climbing over the fence to the woods to collect the egg, no sir.
"well, I saw the Dumb Chicken up in the tree" says the husband. ( sometimes we call the chickens by their characteristics as we can't remember their names) So I look up, and there in a crook of our dark old fir tree shines another egg. She was laying in the tree, and apparently one fell out, bounced down where the dog was sitting, and he thought " I am a good dog , aren't I!"
Sigh.
So David being the awesome chicken owner that he is, put the extra nesting box up in the tree, so she wouldn't just lay on a branch. And put a ladder there so he could climb up and get the eggs. So now we have at least 4 chickens going up into the tree, using the ladder as well, to lay their eggs up where the view is fantastic.