Good Night

Tonight I waited until it was almost dark before I went to lock up the chickens because I wanted to check and see if some of them were sleeping in the nest boxes. First I strolled down to the gate. I love my gate with its night light. Since we are at the end of the road we keep the gate chained and padlocked. When my brother lived here he had people blasting through this property on old dirt roads and knocking down his fences. The area is much more built up now with houses so we haven't had that problem, but some people seem to want to open and drive through unlocked gates, especially at the end of a road. I stood by the gate listening to the neighbor's dog barking at me. It is a good watch dog. Barks at any noise. Then they yell at their dog. I'll post the video I took of the dog barking sometime. Fascinating.

Then I walked back to the chicken coop to check the girls. I think I woke them up. They just sat there clucking at me. It was totally dark in there, so when the flash went off they were startled. My brother had tree branches for the hens to roost on, but I couldn't find any that fit this space, so I used old handles from rakes and shovels. The hens don't seem to mind. I liked the tree branch roosts.

Then I went around and checked this side and found these two hens on top and one in the middle nest box. Tomorrow I will check and see if these are the same hens that are there in the day and if so I will chuck them out of their cozy nests. They need to get out and eat and get a drink. I remember reading that if you want to break a broody hen you need to cool off their tummy. I really don't want to cage these hens so that when they sit they have air circulation under them. I admit it. I'm lazy.

I found an egg in the middle and one in the bottom nest box, but no hen down there.

Kristine's throat is better, but now she has gone to bed early with a headache.

Hope she feels better tomorrow.

Kristine took a photo for me to use in a post, so I'm saving it for when I totally run out of ideas. Thanks for leaving a comment, Kathleen. Thanks you to all who leave me comments. I never thought anyone would read this blog but my family. As soon as I feel a bit better I will answer the comments that have been left. The deal was I was going to make a blog and post on it with at least one photo for every day for a year. And I'm at the half way point already! Time flys. The other part of the plan was that I was going to have the blog printed. I still have to figure out how I want to do that.

[8 eggs today]

None in the dirt!

Smiles

~:>