For the last twenty years, I’ve used the same material in my chickens’ nesting boxes – pine shavings. They’re inexpensive, soft, absorbent and easily cleaned. The chickens can move them about to create the sort of depression that they like to settle down on. I once tried paper from my office shredding machine, but it stuck to the damp eggs. I don’t like straw because a) I don’t want to have to buy a bale and store it, and b) chicken manure gets stuck to it, and then the eggs get dirty. The same with hay.

However, just because I’ve done something for two decades, doesn’t mean that I’m not open to doing things differently when my animals tell me that a change is necessary.

Phoebe’s den is underneath the nesting boxes in the Little Barn. It’s where she sleeps at night and naps during the day. It’s her haven away from the antics of the chickens and their big feet. Her rabbit pellets are there, and her hay, which she fashions into a soft cushion, and nibbles on as well (yes, she eats in bed!) There are granite blocks that allow her access, but keep the chickens  out. This set-up has worked perfectly for three years.

During this winter of the deep snow and the deep freeze, I provided Phoebe with extra hay. The hens noticed. Come February, when laying resumed, I found Phoebe in a corner of the coop, and Nancy Drew busily rearranging the rabbit’s den and turning it into her nesting box. I extracted the chicken and rearranged the blocks, thinking that I could keep a large, fat hen out of Phoebe’s place. Not so. Nancy squeezed back in.

I thought this through. What did the hen want? I guessed that it was the hay. I put some in one of the nesting boxes. Nancy, delighted not to have to deal with Phoebe, or wiggle her way into that den, hopped up and proceeded to lay where I wanted her to. Phoebe, with relief, had her place back.

Do you see Phoebe ensconced underneath? All is right with her world again.

So I tried an experiment in the Big Barn. There are five nesting boxes. I put hay in one. This is what I found the next day. Obviously, hens prefer hay.

I still believe in using pine shavings, and if I didn’t have a rabbit’s den of hay to protect, I wouldn’t use hay for the chickens. But, if you have difficulty getting your hens to lay in your nesting boxes, (perhaps you have one that lays on the floor, or hides her eggs in the run) try hay. Let me know how your girls like the change.

The Marans is a French breed known for its brown eggs. I’ve seen Marans eggs at poultry shows as dark as chocolate bars. I decided that such eggs would be pretty in my basket and so a couple of years ago, when I placed a chick order, I added a Marans to the list. They come in a number of feather variations. The Cuckoo Marans was available, so I got that. These birds are patterned rather like the Dominique. I named the chick Veronica. True to type, she is a friendly and docile bird.

However, the truth is that her eggs have been a disappointment. Shell color is added at the end of the egg-making process. Imagine the egg passing through a car wash, and the dye is the rinse at the end. Sometimes your car isn’t as thoroughly cleaned off as you’d like. Sometimes the spray is uneven. It’s like that in the hen’s reproductive tract, too. (For more about how egg shell color is determined, read this post.) Veronica has always had a glitch in her color-making apparatus.

Veronica has laid pale brown eggs with freckles. She’s laid eggs the color of a brown paper bag. Most hens lay the same color egg day in and day out. Not Veronica. I know which one is hers because she is one of six hens in the Little Barn, and hers is clearly different that the others. Hers isn’t the blue egg laid by Owly or Beatrix, it’s not the white egg laid by Twiggy, and it’s not the smoothly beige eggs laid by the two Red Stars. Hers is the odd brown one. What a surprise, then, that the other day she laid a dark brown egg!

I’ve put it in this bowl so that you can see it in comparison to other eggs. The white one is from the Andalusian, Misty. The spotted one is from Jasper, the Welsummer. The light brown eggs are from Nancy Drew and Beulah. The dark egg – that’s Veronica’s!

It’s dappled instead of being uniformly brown. But that’s okay. Thanks, Veronica!

People not used to goats sometimes look at my boys and ask some rather… ahem… insensitive questions.

Are they supposed to be that big?
Actually, no, they’re supposed to be miniature goats. Somehow, despite the fact that their parents were truly small, they grew taller than the expected twenty or so inches.

They’re rather wide aren’t they?
Yes, they are. Goats have expandable bellies – four stomachs! – and they eat bulky food, so depending on the time of day, they look like overinflated beach balls.

Are they fat?
This question I do worry about. Caper has a bone chip in his right foreleg. Carrying excess weight can exacerbate his lameness. Carrying excess weight isn’t good for many health reasons. This past week, Dr. Sarah came to give the goats their spring shots, so I asked her about their condition. She said, The goats are NOT fat.

The goats say, Told you so. More hay, please.

Bunnies love to dig tunnels. In the wild, rabbits dig underground burrows – which can be quite an extensive system of dens and paths.  Because Phoebe lives outside with the hens, she can indulge in this behavior that is so important for a rabbit to be a rabbit. In the summer, Phoebe attempts to tunnel underground; because the dirt in the pen is packed hard, it is a challenge. This is good, since I don’t want her to make an escape and get taken by a predator. Despite the hard ground, she is still able to dig, and has made wallows so deep that not even her ears show. There’s always a chance that she could make a real tunnel, and so the fence extends eight inches below ground, and I also check the perimeter daily – if she’s been particularly ambitious, I fill in the hole with dirt or rocks.

Winter is Phoebe’s season. She loves the cold weather, she’s far more active when the temperature is well below freezing than in the summer when she’s hot and would rather sprawl out in the wallows that she’s dug than gallop about. This winter, all of her energy has had a focus – snow tunneling.

The chickens have an outside roost right above the entrance to her burrow.

Do you see that opening against the fence? Phoebe did that. She’s been working on this ever since the snow began to accumulate in January. There were times when all that I could see of Phoebe was her bottom and her big rabbit feet kicking snow out behind her.

It took weeks of work, and now her tunnel extends straight under the snow, with an exit on the other side.

The chickens don’t walk over the snow to congregate there, so it’s like a secret passage, just for the rabbit.

The hens don’t go into the tunnel at the main entrance either. A cold snow cave is not the sort of place that chickens like to explore. In any event, they’re not welcome.

I suspect that there are side-tunnels and dens under that snow mound as well. Or at least Phoebe is working on constructing them.

Rabbits are crepuscular, which means that their favorite times of day are dawn and dusk. As night falls, the chickens put themselves to bed in the coop on the roosts. Phoebe has to go inside as well, as she needs to stay safe from hunters that come out in the dark. Usually, when she sees me walking towards the coop she hops right up the ramp. She knows that a carrot or banana chip will be offered to her. Lately, though, those treats can’t compare to a nighttime hop-around her construction site.

So, don’t worry if I haven’t closed the animals up right at sunset. We’re keeping an eye on things, and letting Phoebe play during what she considers the best winter, ever.