Free At Last

Free at last, free at last, the chickens are free at last! (I should have posted this on Monday. Heh.) This winter has been really hard on the chickens. We have rain instead of snow, and temperatures fluctuating between mildly warm and slightly chilly. And the forecast calls daily for mud, mud, and more mud. I have young chickens in the chicken house/yard, and all this muddy chill is hard on them–the mud gets in their feathers and weighs them down. They need to be out on the grass, away from the mud. I’ve had my chickens locked up tight in the chicken house for a long time now after a long series of problems with them free-ranging. (Roosting in the wrong places, and chicken poop where you don’t want it.) But, they’re all well-trained to the house now, and I run at light on a timer that comes on a few hours at dusk, so time to try daytime free-ranging again!