Hens. There is something so charming about them, so quintessentially country. I am sure most people who muse about country life imagine a beautiful feathered gal flouncing along a cottage border, delicately picking out a bit of rosemary here and a spot of sage there. Eeeek! Nope. Reality check required. Lovely yes they are, and if you did have two seconds free, as a smallholder (and mother) it would be wonderful to while away an afternoon, watching their merry ways, picking and scratching the earth for bugs, and lounging in dust baths in the sunshine. So … lovely, yes but delicate they ain’t. They could churn up a manicured garden quicker than a JCB.
And oddly enough it was hens that drove our house making decision. A big garden, lovely as the ones we’d viewed were, just wouldn’t really do. The little ladies could massacre it in no time at all, and let us be honest, we would all like free range to be free range. While looking gorgeous, they are also quite mucky, for want of a better expression, pooping everywhere, continuously … nearly as much as they breath in air. Quite hilarious really, reminding me of the ladies at court in days yonder, in their great layered skirts going wherever they please! In essence, we needed a bit of scrub-land that could handle the onslaught. So great luck that we found our 1.5 acre plot. We started by bringing 10 White Sussex home to at last start our live-stock family. (Light Sussex as they are dual purpose, good layers but also good table birds – thinking like small-holders from the off). We decided to house them in the stable, building them a tall perch, hopefully too high for Mr Fox, chicken meshing the windows for safety and adding mobile nest boxes in a corner. They settled in, providing us with beautiful creamy, proud, bright, golden yoked eggs.
Our plot is surrounded by fields, and neighbours had dutifully warned of fox and badger attacks over the years in the village. With this in mind, we initially let them out of the stable (which is light and has good free-ranging space in it’s own right) only when we were in the field to ensure they got used to their housing accommodation while we acted as guards. Over-time as things went well we soon let out the gals early in the morning, they enjoyed the full field all day long, eating merrily the bugs worms and ticks! (I will write more thoroughly on the subject of ticks in future posts).
After months of chicken bliss, one darker afternoon, I roamed up as usual to plant some vegetable plugs from the greenhouse. The hens were looking somewhat startled. I could see nothing out of the ordinary, but my two labradors, Rhys and Thom thought otherwise. Despite their age they immediately started to sniff the long grass and appeared on a mission to ‘find’ something. Alarmed by their concern I hunted too alongside them, till alas I found a white trail of feathers. Heart racing I followed the feather trail … leading me to the edge of the field where it bordered with our neighbours land by a stone wall … right up to a fox den – or at least I think that is what is was drawing on my extensive knowledge of The Gruffalo with my two 3 year olds.
I shan’t repeat what I called Mr Fox, but drastic measures had to be taken for their safety. We locked them in the stable fearful that he or she should strike again, in broad daylight! Cheeky so-and-so! But what about the free ranging? Something major was needed. Something courageous and brave to protect our poor gals 24/7. After some considerable thought we came up with a plan. What about Alpacas? 🙂
Verm X Layers pellets, 20 kg for hens, great for continuously creating a non-friendly for worms gut environment day in day out, available from Amazon
Fancy Feed mixed corn for hens 20 kg, available from Amazon
Snowflake Dust Extracted Bedding 20 kg, available from Amazon
Light Sussex hen dust bathing
Our Light Sussex hens with growing chicks
Light Sussex hen in the sun