Chickens at last

Well, the chickens are all established in their new home. They came from a free range egg farm in Sussex and, apart from one which has a dodgy foot, they are in very good condition. I was expecting scrawny, featherless almost oven-ready hens so it was a nice surprise to see that these hens had been treated well. As with all eggs farms, battery, barn or free range, once a hen reaches about 72 weeks of age they are slaughtered to make room for the next batch. Egg production drops after this age and therefore are not financially viable for the farmer, which I totally understand. This particular farmer was more than happy for some of his hens to go to new homes rather than the slaughter-house.
So my 8 'ladies' are laying on average 3 eggs a day (they even laid 4 eggs in the car on the way back from Brighton!). It is an absolute joy to go down to the shed in the morning, let them out into the run and come back with eggs for breakfast.
They all have names - Clara, Louisa, Susannah, Hannah, Anastasia, Lily, Malaika and Tasneem. The last 2 are named after friends at work whilst all the others are named after various ladies in my family tree.
I found out about the Brighton hen rescue on the friendly and informative forum http://www.ex-battery-hens.com

If you are thinking of keeping a few hens in your garden then consider rehoming some ex-batts. After all, it's just another form of recycling.

The picture is of one of my hens sporting a rather fetching, rather too large red jumper. As I have said, I was expecting featherless oven readies so had been knitting 'hen cosys' for them. These were not required after all but, well, you just have to take a photo of a chicken wearing a jumper don't you!