Chooks Arrive

The kids have been wanting chooks for ever it seems. Roger always has an excuse why we shouldn't get some chooks (we already have a good local supply of eggs, and who would look after them when we go away, and he doesn't have time to build a run for them), and I don't really mind because I don't like things that flap. But after the last time we visited Nanna and Granddad I realised that there is more to chooks than an egg supply. And more than chook manure and scrap disposal. While we were at Hope Farm I think Odette must have been over to the chooks at least five times every day. Feeding them, checking for eggs, making sure they were shut in at night...The kids absolutely love the chooks.

So despite not having a house or yard built for them the kids and I decided it was time for some chooks. We decided on Friday morning, and by Friday evening we had six chooks! I rang my friend Nan Lloyd who has been our egg supplier and asked if she had some spare chooks, so she said she would round some up for us.

I took the old parrot trap and turned it upside down so that there was wire on the base (to stop foxes getting the chooks) and then put soil and straw over the wire on the ground. We found some old shade cloth and covered the top to stop the chooks flying out. We put a broom and a shovel through the wire to make roosting perches. And then we put the chooks in!

P.S. for overseas readers:

If you didn't know before, then you should have guessed by now, that chooks is what Australians call hens...