Every night, without fail, I have to herd, toss or coax the chickens from the top of their coop to the inside of their coop. This has grown old. (Sigh.)
Note how sad and alone Maude looks (facing away from the camera.) I think she's depressed and that's why she won't lay eggs.
I get a little Dutch hen out of a tree every night. Believe me, I know what it is like.
ReplyDelete~~Matt~~
I guess I will appreciate my girls more who put themselves to bed inside their cozy Omelet Cube roost every night. The fact that my brown easter egger is also not laying shall now be totally forgiven. :-)
ReplyDeleteThe worst is when you're all dressed and ready to go out to dinner and you suddenly realize UGH - THE CHICKENS ARE STILL OUT! This entails carefully stepping across the yard to avoid chicken and/or dog poop in your nice shoes and then herding them as quickly as possible into the coop! Murphy's law dictates that this is when they will be least cooperative.
ReplyDeleteFood is what works for me. I throw a few handfuls of pellets into the coop and in they go. A few are so dumb that they run up and down the side stopping just short of the door just trying to get to the food. But eventually they figure it out. The trick is getting the ones in the STAY in while waiting on the others to figure it out.
ReplyDelete~Randy
Randy, I use food too. The problem is that Maude usually ends up running around the coop in fear/excitement/stupidity without actually going INTO the coop!
ReplyDeleteDo they have a perch inside the coop? Chickens really want to have their feet wrapped around something when they sleep. Just a thought.
ReplyDeleteYep, there is a perch rigged on the outside and the inside of the Eglu has a slatted floor that they seem to like. I think they just like the added height of the top of the coop.
ReplyDeleteyour "depressed "hen may be unwell
ReplyDeleteshe may need a wormer or some apple cider vinegar in her feed...
ok (grandmother and suck eggssorry I guess you know all this anyhow)
nice to find another hen blog, found you care of Randy!!!