Gimme Shelter

The Pirate had made a shade for the chicken yard so that they don't have to stand outside in the rain. Unfortunately, chickens are not so stupid as people would like to make them out, and it didn't take them long to realize that they could fly the two feet to the top of the shade, then another two feet over the fence to relative freedom. It started out being on the low side of the yard, but the Pirate moved it to the high side with the thought of discouraging the chickens from flying up on it. Well, chickens are too stupid to know when they're being discouraged.

When I came out this morning to go to work, I did a last chickie-check and saw that two had escaped - a barred rock hen and a wyandotte cockerel. I grabbed the raisins and squatted down, calling "chick-chick-chick" as I spread the raisins right in front of my toes. The chickens were cautious about coming to peck the raisins in front of me, and when I reached out and grabbed the barred rock (who set up a properly chicken-like squawk as I carried her to the yard), the wyandotte took off and hid under the henhouse.

It took ten minutes of running this way and that way around the henhouse with the herding broom to get the other back into the yard, and then I took the shade out and set it down outside the yard. The Pirate and I are re-thinking the whole sunshade design. I'm not thrilled about letting the chickens out of the yard and into the jaws of the neighbor dog if I can help it.