I have eggs!!!!!

[LizStreithorst]

I have 4 hens laying now.  One is a good hen and lays in the tool box.  Another has a sense of humor and lays  in the fish junk cabinet.  A third lays under the chicken house so I have to get down on my hands and knees and roll the egg to me using a stick   The fourth lays where my husband build a little building on the back of the house to put the hot water heater.  He wasn't a carpenter.  He had never built a house.  Making a place for a water heater didn't occur to him until the house was built, so he put it outside   It never bothered me...We lived in that strangely built house happily for many years and now the chickens are making use of it in it's falling down condition.

Still...I want my chicken to do right and lay in acceptable places.  I don't want to have to hunt all around the property every time I hear a hen sing the egg song.  I was given a used 10 hole commercial laying box about 20 years ago.  It's pretty bashed up after all this time but if I take the sawzaw to the bottom 5 laying boxes I can make the top five usable.  It will be my project for the weekend. 

When the weather turns cool I'll lock the hens in their house for a week.  Chickens, like fish,  have to lay and look for the place that feels best to them.  If they can't lay in their chosen place they will be forced to pick another place.  I was certain that the tool box would be a big hit with them but I was wrong.  I can understand that the sweater boxes aren't secluded enough for them.  The box with 5 nesting places that hangs on the wall with a perch in front will give them more acceptable places to lay when I lock the poor things up for a week.

I hate having to confine animals.  I don't have to do it often but sometimes it's the best solution to a problem.  I locked Charlotte the horse (as opposed to Charlotte the truck) in the pasture this morning because she left a pile of horse shit in her driveway.  The tender grass is getting tough and she went looking for greener pastures.  She'll be locked up until the volunteer rye grass is up enough to graze.  Hell, she gets the best feed twice a day and top quality hay when the grass isn't top quality.  The damn horse has it made. 

I've decided that I can no longer allow Cha Cha to rule my life now that she's healed up and happy.  She's not coming to work with me every day.  I will have to cage her while I'm away.  I hate it but otherwise she will follow me down the road until she looses me and will keep running until she finds someone else who will take her in.  She has to learn that she is mine, and that if I leave I will also come back, then turn her loose and be happy to see her.  I'm finally figuring out how this dog's mind works and what her emotional problems are.  I shall heal her and make her right.  It will involve caging

sorry I went off on a rant.  I thought I was just going to write about chickens.  Chickens are easy.  Horse is easy.  Dogs are not always easy.

[Ron Sower]

I have 4 hens laying now.  One is a good hen and lays in the tool box.  Another has a sense of humor and lays  in the fish junk cabinet.  A third lays under the chicken house so I have to get down on my hands and knees and roll the egg to me using a stick   The fourth lays where my husband build a little building on the back of the house to put the hot water heater.  He wasn't a carpenter.  He had never built a house.  Making a place for a water heater didn't occur to him until the house was built, so he put it outside   It never bothered me...We lived in that strangely built house happily for many years and now the chickens are making use of it in it's falling down condition.

Still...I want my chicken to do right and lay in acceptable places.  I don't want to have to hunt all around the property every time I hear a hen sing the egg song.  I was given a used 10 hole commercial laying box about 20 years ago.  It's pretty bashed up after all this time but if I take the sawzaw to the bottom 5 laying boxes I can make the top five usable.  It will be my project for the weekend. 

When the weather turns cool I'll lock the hens in their house for a week.  Chickens, like fish,  have to lay and look for the place that feels best to them.  If they can't lay in their chosen place they will be forced to pick another place.  I was certain that the tool box would be a big hit with them but I was wrong.  I can understand that the sweater boxes aren't secluded enough for them.  The box with 5 nesting places that hangs on the wall with a perch in front will give them more acceptable places to lay when I lock the poor things up for a week.

I hate having to confine animals.  I don't have to do it often but sometimes it's the best solution to a problem.  I locked Charlotte the horse (as opposed to Charlotte the truck) in the pasture this morning because she left a pile of horse shit in her driveway.  The tender grass is getting tough and she went looking for greener pastures.  She'll be locked up until the volunteer rye grass is up enough to graze.  Hell, she gets the best feed twice a day and top quality hay when the grass isn't top quality.  The damn horse has it made. 

I've decided that I can no longer allow Cha Cha to rule my life now that she's healed up and happy.  She's not coming to work with me every day.  I will have to cage her while I'm away.  I hate it but otherwise she will follow me down the road until she looses me and will keep running until she finds someone else who will take her in.  She has to learn that she is mine, and that if I leave I will also come back, then turn her loose and be happy to see her.  I'm finally figuring out how this dog's mind works and what her emotional problems are.  I shall heal her and make her right.  It will involve caging

sorry I went off on a rant.  I thought I was just going to write about chickens.  Chickens are easy.  Horse is easy.  Dogs are not always easy.

[Mugwump]

   LOL.....love it !!!

[LizStreithorst]

Looks like number 5 has joined in the laying.  I knew that something was up with her.  She was singing the eggs laying song and looking very distressed.  She came in the house looking for a place that suited her but left when she didn't find one.  Finally, she settled down.  I walked out to the hen house and saw her in the tool box.  I already collected the egg from the hen that lays there and the 3 from the three that lay in inappropriate places.  I'm glad that this girl found the place that I made them to lay in.

[Mugwump]

Looks like number 5 has joined in the laying.  I knew that something was up with her.  She was singing the eggs laying song and looking very distressed.  She came in the house looking for a place that suited her but left when she didn't find one.  Finally, she settled down.  I walked out to the hen house and saw her in the tool box.  I already collected the egg from the hen that lays there and the 3 from the three that lay in inappropriate places.  I'm glad that this girl found the place that I made them to lay in.

..1 down....4 to go.....LOL.....when you collect the eggs, do you use an old Easter Basket?...

[LizStreithorst]

Actually, I have 6 more to go.  An Easter basket would be nice but I just pick them up in my hands.

[Mugwump]

Actually, I have 6 more to go.  An Easter basket would be nice but I just pick them up in my hands.

"Cheaper by the Dozen"

[LizStreithorst]

Six eggs today!!!  Only 3 in the wrong place.  If the rest all lay in the correct place I won't bother locking the hens up to train them to do right.

[Ron Sower]