Chickens are birds too...

A rainy, early November day is certainly a cliché in this area.  Today is living up to the cliché. The sky is dark and gloomy, bringing down many fall leaves.  In this weather no photos were possible, which goes to explain why I’m posting a photo of several of my chickens.

The chickens had just discovered my bird feeders, no small feat in itself, as my back deck is well above head high and only accessed from the ground by 8 steps.  They apparently wandered up the steps and so found themselves at the bird feeders.  They soon began to clean the deck of seed tossed out by the wild birds. I have yet to see the chickens up on the table where several of the feeders are located. However, I am thinking that won’t be far away.

Once up on the back the deck the chickens discovered I was inside, with cats and Baby Dog. They thought that was pretty interesting, too, and probably wondered why they couldn’t come in as well. One or the other of them has tried to follow me in the front door more than once but end up being deterred by said cats and dog.

Chickens, I have learned, are much smarter than they are usually given credit for. They are not dumbbells.  And, they have a wide variety of sounds, each with meaning.  Doodle, my rooster, always alerts the girls to airborne danger—two days ago it was a Cooper’s hawk—and how close the danger is. When something is very close, the sound is more insistent and the girls (and often the cats, too) run for cover.  Other times, he warns that danger is near but not immediately overhead and that’s enough to stop the hens in their tracks to eyeball the potential intruder until they decide if hiding will be needed. The chickens are nearly as much fun to watch as the wild birds.  

A rainy, early November day is certainly a cliché in this area.  Today is living up to the cliché. The sky is dark and gloomy, bringing down many fall leaves.  In this weather no photos were possible, which goes to explain why I’m posting a photo of several of my chickens.

The chickens had just discovered my bird feeders, no small feat in itself, as my back deck is well above head high and only accessed from the ground by 8 steps.  They apparently wandered up the steps and so found themselves at the bird feeders.  They soon began to clean the deck of seed tossed out by the wild birds. I have yet to see the chickens up on the table where several of the feeders are located. However, I am thinking that won’t be far away.

Once up on the back the deck the chickens discovered I was inside, with cats and Baby Dog. They thought that was pretty interesting, too, and probably wondered why they couldn’t come in as well. One or the other of them has tried to follow me in the front door more than once but end up being deterred by said cats and dog.

Chickens, I have learned, are much smarter than they are usually given credit for. They are not dumbbells.  And, they have a wide variety of sounds, each with meaning.  Doodle, my rooster, always alerts the girls to airborne danger—two days ago it was a Cooper’s hawk—and how close the danger is. When something is very close, the sound is more insistent and the girls (and often the cats, too) run for cover.  Other times, he warns that danger is near but not immediately overhead and that’s enough to stop the hens in their tracks to eyeball the potential intruder until they decide if hiding will be needed. The chickens are nearly as much fun to watch as the wild birds.