Yesterday I gave the girls watermelon for the first time. I have read on other blogs how much chickens like pumpkin and thought as they are always half price after halloween that I would wait until then to get them one. This is the first year I haven’t seen them on sale after halloween in any of the shops. Not a pumpkin to be found anywhere. I was kicking myself for not buying one earlier so instead looked on the sale fruit and veg shelf and bought the girls a slice of watermelon.
Treacle, Pepper and Dotty came straight over to try it
Bluebell joins them
It’s unusual for Bluebell not to come straight away but she was having such a lovely dust bath under the bush that she couldn’t tear herself away at first. When I returned a little later there was just the empty skin left. I think I can safely say that they like watermelon!
Last night it rained all night, frequently waking me. It was hammering down and I was worried about how the new plastic cover was holding up and whether the water was draining through the holes I had made.
When I went out at seven in the morning I was really pleased to see that the drainage holes had worked and the plastic was flat with no pools of water on it. If it can take that much heavy rain it should be okay.
I am disappointed that the run is not drying out though. I think if we had put the cover over dry earth it may have kept it relatively dry but we put it over a quagmire and I am beginning to wonder if it will ever dry out. The problem is we have had rain most days and it is forecast to continue wet over this month. If it would only stop raining for a bit it might dry out but there seems little chance of that at the moment. The water also drains down under the plastic cover as the run slopes down but at least it gives the girls an area out of the rain to walk on even if the ground is not yet dry. I think it’s the best we can do for now. We just need to wait for it to stop raining!
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