Port Potager

The additional daylight in the spring means that the chickens begin laying again, after a sporadic winter of not doing very much. Martha and Rachel got the memo weeks ago and are going their jobs well: Sally is also a champ. But sometimes this happens: As you can see, Sally’s eggs has been pecked open and eaten. That blob on the floor of the nesting box shows that several eggs have been raided and destroyed over that past few days. This is not a protein or calcium issue, as they have plenty of extra seeds and oyster shells to eat. This seems to be about spite. I caught Abigail — who, it should be noted, hasn’t laid an egg in months — pecking away at one just the other day. jerk. Kirk and I were also talking just lat night about how Lizzy — the worst chicken — also hasn’t laid any eggs in recent memory, and how she’s generally not earning her keep at all .  And then today I found that she had, in fact laid an egg.  And it was eaten. Along with ...

The wolf shall also dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid, and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. ~Isaiah 11:6 Under careful supervision, we started letting the chickens out at the same time Fletch was around. The chickens were terrified of him at first and all flew across the yard in a big pile of feathers and clucking. Fletch definitely looked interested and took a few stalking steps toward them, but I gave a warning and Tiegan gave him petting, and he has barely looked at them since. After a couple days, the chickens calmed down enough to come out of the coop, even with Fletch standing guard: I really wish I had been out earlier with my camera, when Fletch was literally lying down in the grass while the chickens ate the grass around him. That inspired my thinking about our own peaceable kingdom, which has really come along this summer. We have our own little lion lying do...