Escaping to the Outdoors

As things get more and more stressful at work, the escape outdoors becomes essential. After spending hours wrestling with a mountain of paperwork, I snuck out for an hour to the allotment. It’s amazing what an hour surrounded by green space can do to your mood.

I left feeding the chickens until later in the day as I still had more paperwork to do. It’s an incentive to get it don’t quicker! I had a chat with all the usual faces and pottered around the plot, trying to decide what to do with each bed next year. I have several ideas but nothing concrete yet.

Back at home, I let our Gordon and his gang of girls. They enjoy being outside their run but they now need watching very closely! I turned my back for two minutes (just two!) and discovered one of the partridge bantam girls up on the patio table! They explored the garden for an hour, simultaneously terrorising the cats and the poor silkies.

With the weather rapidly clouding over, we quickly moved the silkies coop to a new patch of grass. Our poor lawn has taken a beating this year! But over the next few days, we will be planting new grass to try to build it back up. During the wettest parts of the winter, the silkies will be between the side of the house and next door’s garden wall. This will provide lots of protection from the wind and the worst of the rain.

Later in the evening, we both walked down the allotment to feed the chickens. The sun was coming through the clouds and the forecast rain hadn’t appeared. Between us, we topped up the food and water bowls and gave out their treats. The Buff Orpington still seems to prefer hiding in the nest box but at least she isn’t constantly being attacked! The rest of our feathery flock seem healthy and relatively happy – there is no such thing as an entirely content chicken unless it is scoffing treats! The new coop floor was absolutely covered in feathers – I have never seen anything like it! I honestly don’t know how Leia still has any feathers judging from the amount she has moulted! She is currently half the size and it really makes you appreciate what a good job the feathers do in insulating the bird. Even though she’s half the size with a fraction of the feathers she should have, I have every confidence she will be warm enough over night.

So the plan for the next couple of days is to hoe over the plot again and try to get a handle on the weeds at the back of the plot.