Chicken Summer

These girls are having a rough summer (too). First there was a fence put up around the garden– their favorite place to hang out in the summer, whether it is getting dirt baths in the shade of the asparagus plants or pecking at such a wide variety of produce or nibbling greens.

There was a lot of rain and they decided their laying box (i.e., cat litter box) was disgusting and not a good place to lay eggs. But when they started laying them in lovely prairie spots (where they would never be found), they were punished by not being allowed out of the pen until late in the day.

They found an alternate place to lay, under the coop, and really, the coop was getting pretty gross, too, with the back-up keeper and no fresh straw for months. Wasps even started building a nest there. (Luckily, it got a good cleaning yesterday and the wasp nest is gone now.)

THEN, a rabbit made what can only be described as a chicken door in the garden fence. Hooray! Things were starting to look up.

Oh, sure, sometimes Fred laid her eggs in odd places (like here beneath the rain gutter by the garage door– it’s Easter every day around here). But for a week they could go in and out of the wonderful garden at will. Until someone plugged up that chicken door with what is definitely not chicken wire.

Still. There’s always food– and even sometimes watermelon and corn chips and popcorn from the nice next-door neighbor. And the cold frame is half empty and the best place ever for dirt baths. And it’s just better than winter in every way, when they’re cooped up in that dark, cold barn.