My husband and I are chicken newbies, and we only recently finished the coop. It only took our six pullets ONE NIGHT to figure out the coop thing better than we had! I went out at dusk and they had cooped themselves beautifully. Aren't those instincts amazing? Anyway, we are trying to figure out exactly when they put themselves to bed, so I check on them frequently. At around 5:30 it was still very much light out and rather hot, but the forecast included a severe thunderstorm watch. Chickens running around, fully awake. Too hot to coop them yet. 5:45, it begins to rain, but the clouds aren't nasty and the chickens aren't worried. And very much not sleepy. 6:15, raining harder now. Okay, it's close enough to bedtime... but chickens say no. Chasing chickens in the rain. They hide under the coop where I can't get them without getting on my hands and knees. I manage to get three in, but they are dodging and trying to get out while I'm getting the others. I say screw it, they clearly don't mind the rain and are NOT SLEEPY. I am decidedly wet. 6:40. Driving rain, wind, crashing thunder and lightning. Deluge, gutters overflowing. I unsuccessfully try and search BYC to see if you are supposed to coop chickens during sudden summer thunderstorms. Guilt attack. I recruit my husband to come out with me and catch recalcitrant chickens who are VERY MUCH AWAKE. He is reluctant to grab the little darlings, so I get on my hands and knees in the mud and start snatching them up while my husband guards the pop door. I am on the ground when I hear "ACK", clucks, and feather noises, and the number of chickens huddling under the coop is increasing, not decreasing. And I'm getting stink eye like woah. Finally we get them all in, lock down the door, count beaks, and we're out. Wring ourselves out on the front porch, soaked to the skin in minutes. 7:30, storm has passed. Chickens are roosting cozily and blinking at me. My hair is wet. Did I mention Imm afraid of lightning?
LOL! I can just see it because that was us a couple weeks ago! Storm of the century that popped up out of nowhere! Thunder, lightening, and 70MPH wind gusts. Got them all up as it was getting bad and then a gust blows over my chickens coop!!! I was out there dodging falling limbs and dashing back out in between lightening strikes and I'm TERRIFIED of lightening because I was struck by it in high school. My husband is watching from the garage and my daughter is screaming from the back door afraid the chickens will get hurt!!! The things we do to protect our babies!
I have got caught in three major thunderstorms in the past 4 weeks. its crazy what we will do to make sure our babys are ok
I did this when my first batch of chickens first went outside. I remember everyone thinking I was nuts....I was. I've since learned that they eventually figure it out on their own. Unless there is a hurricane coming, the birds can choose whether or not to go inside.
