Big doings

Under cover of darkness, we have just combined our two chicken houses. The birds will have all night to get used to each other's presence before they are actually able to see each other. And when the sun rises, I'll be there to make sure no one gets injured in the pecking-order-sorting-out process.

All of the roosters tried to "spur" me, but the only injury I sustained was when I whacked my head on a shelf in one of the houses. (For the record: Ow.) Some of the birds screamed their little lungs out while we were moving them. It sounded as though we were torturing someone. I halfway expected a police cruiser to pull up in the driveway!

So why all the animal-shuffling? Well, Chicken House #2 is plenty large enough to accommodate all our chickens, and it has two big outdoor yards that they can run in. We don't want to grow our chicken operation any more; I like knowing all the chix individually. So we are converting Chicken House #1 to a garden shed, and we're plowing the outdoor yards of Chicken House #1 and making them part of the garden.

Speaking of the garden, the s.o. and I spent a while today preparing some beds. Peas and fava beans will go in this week!