lately

my poor little Light Sussex hen Daisy has been a very brave girl today....she laid an enormous egg....yesterdays was normal size and todays i think will be a double yolker.... :-)

The girls are getting off to bed a little earlier every night now, its sad to think that soon it will be winter again, and that there will be fewer eggs....I am enjoying the lovely fresh eggs I have for breakfast, and look forward to my double yolk one ...

impacted crop

no photos as I had mislaid my camera.....

This weekend Daisy had a very heavy lop-sided neck. A quick look on the internet told me it might be an impacted crop. I gave her a couple of drops of olive oil and massaged the lump, it felt very heavy and firm, a bit like modeling clay. I squished it around a bit gently and then left her alone....next morning it had cleared up, but by evening her lop-sided look had returned, but not as heavy as the day before, perhaps she is ok and is just lop-sided naturally, I will keep an eye on her. There is a suggestion on the internet to feed them live white maggotts, these maggotts eat the food around the grass or whatever is causing the blockage, sounds disgusting, but a lot better than cutting her crop open, or sticking a tube down her throat to flush it away...euwww....

This morning I could only count 2 hens.

I felt foolish as I went around the garden calling and thinking one of them was hiding, but the other 2 girls were following me making a new 'noise' if they had been human they would have been pointing and shouting "she's over there".....!! some how one of them ( Letty) had got over an 8ft wall! We had trimmed all the feathers we were shown to trim by the farmer so hadn't expected any escapes. I went quickly to the neighbour with the large dog to see if Letty had got into his vegetables, but no, not there, instead she had flown into the garden of a bird phobic lady who had got her boyfriend to chase the poor hen around the garden and was going to shoo her on to the road!!!! I was just in time ( the neighbour didn't know I had hens because the girls are very quiet ( usually ) ), needless to say a quick session of wing clipping later they are safe in the garden again....phew
I thought keeping hens was a peaceful pursuit....lol

oh yes, one of them is laying double yolkers, yum :-)

fruit

I am so pleased that my hens appear to hate blackcurrants ( my favourite fruit) and even though this fruit bush is right next to their scratching ground they have left it alone. the leaves are very pungent so perhaps that is why.....whatever the reason I am happy , yum :-)

sunny today.....

today i have been out walking and collecting green stuff for the girls..... I picked a huge bunch of chickweed and then found a large area of 'Fat Hen' so I have chopped it all up and added it to a sweet cabbage( finely chopped). I added this all to a handful of oat, wheat and rice flakes for their supper......it does make me smile how greedy they are, it makes me feel like a great chef :-)
Today only 2 eggs.......another great pleasure is collecting them and finding that they are still warm.....small pleasures but good ones :-)

another thunder storm

Last evening there was another thunder storm.....I rushed out to see if the girls were cowering in their roost, but no, they were standing out in it all and soaked through. The only worry i had about them being so wet was that it was so close to the time they like to go to bed, so I Iocked them into their undercover pen and hoped they would dry out before they went to bed. Today they seem OK, but I wonder what the eggs will be like?

hooray

a sunny afternoon / evening at last, and the girls had fun finding insects and digging in the garden. Only 2 eggs today....... someone is having a rest . today i gave them grated carrot in oat porridge with a spoonful of cottage cheese..... they jumped into the bowl before I could put it down! Carrot is supposed to help protect them from worms....they just seem to enjoy the sweetness, which is good :-)

grass for a muddy day

Today i fed the hens some of the grass i have been growing in trays, they were getting bored and hungry for fresh green stuff.....I put the tray down in their enclosure and they demolished it! all the grass was gone and roots picked clean in under 15 mins......a success then :-)