Sunday, September 16, 2007

Free Range Day





















Once or twice a week, I lock up the dogs in the kennel and let the chickens and turkeys out to gorge themselves on grass, weeds, seeds, bugs and whatever else they can find. Some of them did a little gardening in the big planter beside the garage; they are terrific weeders, but they aren't terribly discriminating about what they pull up!

The top photo is my two young Blue Slate turkeys and an Isa Brown hen. There's a Barred Rock hen almost hidden under the rose bush at the back of the planter.

The second photo is one of the "mutt" chickens hatched last summer.

The third photo is more Isa Browns, a Turken and a Silver-Laced Wyandotte exploring down the side of my driveway.

The fourth photo is the incomparable Turkenstein fresh from her summer moult, all glossy and beautiful.

And finally, #5 is a frustrated Traveler on one side of the fence and the black Silkie rooster on the other.

4 comments:

thebellagreyhound said...

Mummy can't I play with the chickens?? I promise to be gentle!

Anonymous said...

oh man, the grey is focused!

silkies are beautiful. are they as wonderful as the breeders say?

Val said...

Traveler watched that Silkie go from one end of the driveway to the other. He wanted to chomp him so bad!

I haven't had the Silkies long enough to form much of an opinion of them yet. They are funny little birds. I am extremely fond of my turkeys though. They are very personable birds.

paola_ said...

A greyhound and a bird! This is interesting!

Tara is not into birds, and last summer when we visited friends with hens didn't really pay that much attention to them (the hens were behind a fence - she checked them once then concentrated on destroying the kitchen garden...)
Ever since we've been wondering what would happen if she was ever allowed to be free with chickens or hens? My guess is that it'd be a disaster (except that hens can be quite nasty if they want to), my SO says that maybe she'd get on with the birds ok. (My theory is that if it's behind a fence it's boring, if it's running away or walking where you can catch it it's interesting.)