A funny true story I thought I would share.
My chickens are free range on an old farm yard in the centre of the village where I live. I lock them in a stable at night but they roam free during the day. My neighbour who is a great guy, has 7 hens in a pen on his allotment garden next door. There is a large wall and a building dividing the two properties. One of my hens, a little exchequer leghorn pullet has taken to going into the loft above the stable, squeezing out through a hole under the eaves and dropping down some 20 feet into his garden. wandering around having a gawp at the neighbours(his hens) and then returning.
I have 7 exchequer leghorns and struggle to tell them apart so I just do a hed count on a night before I close up.
Two nights ago I was one missing at bedtime. I hunted high and low, up ladders, under sheds, across fields and through undergrowth but no sign of feathers or the missing pullet. Five times I returned to the stable and recounted (I have 27 chickens in that stable including the 7 leghorns) before I eventually gave up and locked up without her. The next morning she turned up, so I assumed she had just found a little nest somewhere and lost track of time.
Last night my neighbour accosted me to inform me that he had had a lodger!
It turns out he had opened his pen to allow his chickens to free range in his garden for an hour and during that time, my little monkey had snuck in and made herself at home in his hen house. He had herded his girls back into the pen and locked up but not checked inside the hen house, so it wasn't until the next morning, when he went to clean up droppings that he found my little girl in his hen house supervising one of his hens laying an egg....(his hens are shockingly poor layers!) and being a well brought up young chuck, she even left payment for her board and lodgings..... or maybe it was just to remind my neighbour what an egg looked like!
She was totally unfazed by being in a hen house and run with 7 strange hens all twice her size. Funny when you think how much trouble some people have integrating one hen into an established flock. My neighbour was very good about it and even offered to give me the egg back which of course I couldn't accept.. He has talked about culling his birds as he is so disappointed with their performance and I have offered to let him have some of mine, so maybe this pullet heard me suggesting it and was volunteering.
They are such funny creatures!
My chickens are free range on an old farm yard in the centre of the village where I live. I lock them in a stable at night but they roam free during the day. My neighbour who is a great guy, has 7 hens in a pen on his allotment garden next door. There is a large wall and a building dividing the two properties. One of my hens, a little exchequer leghorn pullet has taken to going into the loft above the stable, squeezing out through a hole under the eaves and dropping down some 20 feet into his garden. wandering around having a gawp at the neighbours(his hens) and then returning.
I have 7 exchequer leghorns and struggle to tell them apart so I just do a hed count on a night before I close up.
Two nights ago I was one missing at bedtime. I hunted high and low, up ladders, under sheds, across fields and through undergrowth but no sign of feathers or the missing pullet. Five times I returned to the stable and recounted (I have 27 chickens in that stable including the 7 leghorns) before I eventually gave up and locked up without her. The next morning she turned up, so I assumed she had just found a little nest somewhere and lost track of time.
Last night my neighbour accosted me to inform me that he had had a lodger!
It turns out he had opened his pen to allow his chickens to free range in his garden for an hour and during that time, my little monkey had snuck in and made herself at home in his hen house. He had herded his girls back into the pen and locked up but not checked inside the hen house, so it wasn't until the next morning, when he went to clean up droppings that he found my little girl in his hen house supervising one of his hens laying an egg....(his hens are shockingly poor layers!) and being a well brought up young chuck, she even left payment for her board and lodgings..... or maybe it was just to remind my neighbour what an egg looked like!
She was totally unfazed by being in a hen house and run with 7 strange hens all twice her size. Funny when you think how much trouble some people have integrating one hen into an established flock. My neighbour was very good about it and even offered to give me the egg back which of course I couldn't accept.. He has talked about culling his birds as he is so disappointed with their performance and I have offered to let him have some of mine, so maybe this pullet heard me suggesting it and was volunteering.
They are such funny creatures!
