On May 19, 2008, at 10:43 PM, Marie McHarry wrote:
It's only necessary to feed chickens in winter in my
experience. The rest of the year, they'll get fat on bugs, grubs,
weeds, and whatever else they can get their beaks around.
Happy to hear that. I am currently experimenting. Now withholding
grain and trying to train them to come into the Taj Mahen at night
when I call and rattle a small container with egg pellets in it. Like
all teens, they want to stay out after dark and I want them secured so
I can stop thinking about them.
With only three hens, this fenced yard might be enough to feed them.
And I am scheming an overhead wire design to thwart the hawks, like
the cheeky one that flew right up to and perched in the walnut tree
directly above where the hens were lounging under their raised porch.
And which flew away so fast when I went out that I was sent to the
bird ID book and determined that it was a peregrine falcon, the first
I have ever seen. Too small, certainly, to carry a hen away but big
enough to kill. Beautiful bird.
I bought these three RIReds about a month ago. They had apparently
been raised in a building and for days would not even come outside. I
finally forced the issue with the water pan. Now they are scratching
and pecking away almost as if they know what they're doing. Ain't
instinct wonderful.