Friday I was playing around on the computer when Kristine came up and stood beside me. I thought she was waiting until I was finished to tell me something. As I turned to face her I found a chicken foot in my face. It was Buff Brahma feather foot wound up with string.
Kristine said she was looking out the window and saw a chicken fall forward and lay there on our decorative rock pile. The hen had string snagged around both feet and the string had caught on a rock and tripped the hen onto her face. The hen managed to get herself scooted around, pecked away at the string around the rock, got it loose, and got back on her feet and hopped and shuffled away. I guess she had had to deal with the string long enough to learn how to get unhooked. Kristine said that even with the hens feet hooked together it was still hard to catch her.
Kristine brought the hen to me so I could help cut the string off this foot and also so I could take some pictures. Duh. She had to remind me. One of the hens toes was a little swollen and had a mark, but luckily there were no cut marks from the string. Kristine said the hen just clucked a few times when she put her back on the porch and walked off clucking quietly. The hen hadn't made a sound in the house or even moved. I hadn't noticed the string on the hen earlier in the day. Maybe it happened after I unlocked the coop? Tom said it looked like string from a feed sack. Maybe. But I always throw the strings away in a feed sack I keep in the shed just for trash.
Today I found two more dirt eggs. I am getting a basket full of dirt eggs that I don't really know what to do with. The last time I tried to bury them in hopes of adding nutrients to the garden soil. I dug a deep hole, but even so, some critter dug them up and made a mess. I think I will try again to bury them, but I will dig an even deeper hole and role a tree trunk or something on top. Or I could just send them to the dump. It just seems like such a waste. We don't have a rooster so I can't try to hatch them. I need to turn the tall nest box around in the coop to face the roosts and see if the hens will go in it instead of in the corner to lay eggs.
More remodel stuff to do in the chicken coop. I do like building stuff!
[3 eggs today]
2 in the dirt
phooey!
Smiles
~:>
3 comments:
Poor Chicken! I'm glad she found her before she got injured badly!
That was an awfully fine string. It sure wasn't baling twine. Isn't it amazing that if there's any possibility of animals getting into trouble, they will.
I'm not quite clear on why you throw away eggs laid on the ground. You can test them for freshness by seeing if they tip up or float when placed in a pot of water.
If really rotten, you could always take them out into the woods and let the critters enjoy them far from the madding crowd.
At least the legs were ok and you found her soon enough. I have the same question as the Old Gray Egg. I will usually break the egg in a seperate bowl also to make sure that it is ok.
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