Check out my Chicken Keeping Web page. I’ve reorganized the resources and links section and added a few more useful sites to peruse and fun things to look at. I’m on the lookout for chicken artists (not hens that paint — though that’d be really interesting!) — but artists who are inspired by chickens. Also, I’ve added a list of blogs about hens. I’ll keep the list small and well-curated. You’ll know it’s current and worth reading if it’s on my site. (Don’t you just get so annoyed clicking out-of-date links?)

On to henhouse news: Tweedledum is finally up and about. No telling how long she’ll take a break from broodiness, but it is so nice to see her silly self strutting around the yard.

The days are getting shorter and we’re getting fewer eggs. We’re down to finding about five to six eggs a day. Snowball, the slacker, stopped laying ages ago. But now the big girls are laying less frequently, too. Still, I’m hoping for a winter like last year when we continued to get enough eggs to feed my family. It helps that the henhouse windows face east and the roost gets sunlight early.

And finally, here’s another quote from The Biggle Poultry Book, this edition published in 1917: “The hen that sits on the roost or fence in zero weather, or stands on one leg in the snow all day, is not a winter layer.” I’m going to watch for that this winter!

I wore my favorite pair of jeans into the hens’ yard the other day. Big Mistake! These jeans have decorative buttons sewn along the hem. The girls were sure that I had brought a new type of treat for them to try. So, I will have to stick with classic clothes — no fancy garb in the coop!

I have recently purchased a slight, yet wise, book. Published in 1895, The Biggle Poultry Book has advice for farmers, and as Mr. Biggle calls it, those who keep a “village hennery.” (I love that term!) The start of each chapter has a quote from either his wife, Harriet, or Tim, the farm manager, or Tim’s wife. Here’s one: “To me, eggs are like morals – they have no middle ground. If not good, they are bad.” — Harriet

Here’s another saying from Harriet: “In cold weather keep your eyes open and the cracks in the hen house closed.”

I’ll have more from Harriet, Tim and Mr. Biggle in future HenBlogs.

Yesterday, as I was harvesting veggies for dinner, I cut the tough tops off of a few leeks and tossed them into the chicken run. The girls also got the old bean stalks, carrot greens and a few insect-chewed kale leaves. The hens clucked and chuckled at this manna from what appeared to be heaven – being as how I was literally throwing it over the fence and into their yard, it must have appeared to them as gifts from the gods.

Awhile later, after prepping my own dinner in the kitchen, I came out with a few more veggie scraps for the girls and the compost. Walking through their pen, I noticed that Petunia had a long leek leaf hanging from her mouth. Really long, about ten inches. She was trying to swallow it, and was taking it in like a worm. Of course, a chicken can’t spit something out. Once she started, she had to finish. Petunia had a distressed look in her eyes. Eating a tough long leek in this way must be uncomfortable! Not to mention a choking hazard. So I pulled and pulled and out it came. It was at least sixteen inches. Poor Petunia was vastly relieved to be done with that leek.

Is there a lesson in this story? Perhaps “don’t feed hens anything that looks remotely like a worm.” Or, ‘chop up long, stringy things before tossing them to the girls.” Or, “keep an eye on your hens; you never know what sort of trouble they can get into.” Or, “if you’re going to keep chickens, you can’t get grossed out at things like pulling a leek out of a gullet.”

We live less than 30 miles outside of Boston, but there’s lots of wildlife around here. Just last week a black bear came and smashed our bird feeders to bits and ate all of the highly caloric, fattening sunflower seeds, which is the ideal meal for a big animal that needs to bulk up before hibernation. We’ve bought another feeder, but will wait to put seed out until the bear is sound asleep.

Several of you have asked why some of the hens are bare around their vents (that’s a chicken term for “butt”). Snowball is at least partly to blame. When the hens loll about, taking dust baths, Snowball pecks at the now easy-to-reach vent feathers. She’s little and never draws blood. Annoying, but rarely so bad that the bathers bother to get up. Chickens pick up weird habits.

Oh, and by the way, Candy is fine, she’s just shedding big clumps of fur. Her way of getting ready for winter. Yes, the leaves are beginning to turn colors. Summer is over.