We are just about wrapping up everything in the garden before we go on vacation next week. It truly feels like fall around here. We picked the final tomatoes and beans and corn and many of the peppers. I made a large batch of green tomato salsa with our tomatoes and jalapenos and anaheim peppers. I made a batch of hot garlic pickles with the last cucumbers and our hot thai peppers. We still have the popcorn out there that needs to dry. And, I am still wishing and hoping for all my greek sweet butternut squash to ripen. They are showing more and more orange and I am hoping that when we come back from our trip they will all have ripened up and be ready for the harvest. The kids have been picking some of the peas from the second round of planting and eating them right in the garden. We have been letting the chickens out to free range daily now and they are so happy to pick away at the remaining tomatoes and get all the bugs and worms they can find. Finn and Josette love running around with the chickens and picking them up. Finn is constantly walking around with a chicken and showing them places in the yard he thinks they will like. Josette likes to point and one and say, “that one likes to be cuddled” and then ask that we put it in her lap. And, what of our notorious chicken killing dog? She likes to graze amongst the chickens for garden scraps paying no mind to the birds. It is quite fun when we leave the house and go out into the yard, the flock of chickens comes running to us in hopes of treats. They are looking quite ragged these days as they are moulting and we have feathers everywhere. They are still laying pretty well though, as I have heard they slow down during the molt. Yesterday, we ran out into our yard and had a surprise. We hadn’t yet let the chickens out, but there was a flock of birds in the garden and field that Josette went running towards. Wait, Josette, those are big chickens!!!
do you leave your chickens by themselves when they’re roaming thru your yard or do you “supervise” them when they’re out running around? just wondering how hands on you have to be with them?
We just leave them. Once they are out, it isn’t easy getting them back in – some are happy to be picked up, but others you have to chase around to grab them. But, they all happily march back to the coop to roost at night. Generally, ours don’t seem to venture too far. I do worry about them wandering over to our neighbors gardens, but so far they haven’t. You don’t have to be hands on at all, but they will definitely dig in the dirt around gardens and plants. I have heard that if you build a dust bath area they will train to that, but I don’t know.