Unlike ‘Merica’ these last 8 years, our chickens are lucky – they live in a benevolent dictatorship. This weekend we had made a little chicken door that would lead to the run. Crouched inside the coop with the chickens, they took out their boredom on me by jumping onto my back and pecking me in the butt while I worked. Yesterday we finished the door and roof for the run and opened the little chicken door to let them outside for the first time in their lives. Our little inquisitive Australorp stood at the edge of the door, one foot curled around the threshold. Greta managed to fly right out with a loud shriek, shriek loudly outside, and bound back inside in the space of 3 seconds. Start over. All three cautiously stepped out and within 3 minutes Greta and Libby were rolling around in the duff looking like they’d fallen out of a tree. Greta even took a nap. Funny chickens.

We sat and watched them for a long while as they bathed, and scratched, and found little nibblets, both organic and inorganic (finally some grit for their crop!!). They are getting to be real chickens now. They’ve quadrupled in size over the past 6 weeks and even have feathers covering their heads. Their personalities appear set – Rocky bold, Greta clumsy and shrieky, littlest Lib curious and friendly.