We have been keeping laying hens for quite a few years now, they all have names and the children can tell them all apart… They are so amazing to watch… We often just sit and watch their movements around the garden , the way they scratch in the dirt for small bugs, how they sandbath in a soft sandy spot and the way they run, this is all very entertaining. After they sandbath, they are covered in damp sand and if you pick them up, they feel incredibly heavy…
This photo above is of our chickens’ housing, it is a wooden house 3 metres by 3 metres, with a verandah, we have also enclosed a small area with wire fencing for them to roam around. After they have eaten in the morning and layed their eggs, we open the door at the back of their house and they are free to move around the entire front garden. Most of the day they range free eating grass and small insects and grit. The little pebbles / grit aid with their digestion. We have planted a number of fruit trees around their enclosure to give them shade over the next few months / years. We have planted apples, a prune tree and a Peacan Nut tree and as well as providing the chickens with shade, we will also benefit from the fruit and nuts…
This is the inside of their house with perches on the sides. Chickens really like to roost when they sleep and every afternoon around 5:30 pm they all walk into their house and find their spot on their perches, we close their door to keep them safe and warm. They all know exactly where their specific spot is and that is where they sleep every night. We also spread fresh straw over the floor to keep it clean and they also love to scratch in it.
We only have seven chooks and these are their laying baskets that are lined with straw. Every morning, after they have eaten their laying mash, they all take turns to lay their eggs in a basket. They only like to use one basket at a time, so they seem to alternate between the two but either use one or the other, never both at the same time.
We feed them laying mash everyday and into this we add additional seeds, barley, oats, mealie meal etc… We also give them ground up egg shells once a week to help with digestion and give them calcium, but we make sure that the shells have been finely crushed first so that they don’t have any ideas about eating their own eggs:) We also have a bowl in the kitchen, where we keep any leftovers that they can eat, oats porridge, scrambled egg, salad vegetables etc… All of this is really good for their diet. It is also vitally important that they have fresh water everyday. And in return we are gifted with the most beautiful free range eggs, with yolks that are golden yellow…
This is Bumbles (named by the children)…
Today we took them to the back garden where we have our compost heaps, they are scratching through our middle heap, aerating the compost and giving it a good turn over.
We all went and sat outside in our little fruit orchard to watch them while they were scratching on the compost heaps…
Wishing you all a wonderful week ahead…
