With just eleven hens in the yard these days, they're each getting a whole lot of love. Add to that the melting snow (they are so happy), the puddles that bliss out the duck, and all the kitchen scraps (now that we're not feeding pigs for a month or so), and well...I think we've got some pretty happy hens.
(Now. If they wouldn't mind rerturning the love this way by laying more than three eggs a day, I'd be ever so grateful.)
Meanwhile, in the brooder in the barn, the new chicks are growing, growing, growing. We have a bit of a hunch already that one of the austrolorps is a rooster. Can you believe that in all our ordering of chicks we haven't had an 'accidental' rooster? We wouldn't mind, and we're watching to see if Henrietta does indeed turn out to be a Henry. All of them - Henrietta, Judy Pecker, Ruby and the others - are in that rather awkward adolescent phase of chick growth with their feathers coming in here and there and going every which way. It doesn't matter - as you can see, they are adored just the same.
