The Great Escape

CLUCK, CLUCK, CLUCK!!!

I guess I need to thank Dan for a short burst of creativity here. Yesterday morning, he loaded up the last of the Beefy Boys (until our next bunch show up) Mario and Luigi (sorry Shaw fans...last years cute little calves are all grown up and headed to the big Steer Lot in the Sky). Instead of backing the cattle trailer into the steer lot and running them into it like he usually does, he took advantage of a horseless barn and backed the trailer into the front of the barn and ran them up the aisle into the trailer. This process was done by opening the back pen for the steers....something that usually isn't done, and this back pen is shared with the chickens (since they have full access to the entire steer lot...confused yet?)

I noticed a chickie here and there out in the yard yesterday, but that is nothing abnormal since a couple tend to sneak out everyday anyway. Usually one of those culprits is Fumm, but with his tiny size I figure he might be able to squeeze out of holes the bigger chickens would have difficulty with. Usually Fumm struts back and forth at the entrance to the barn like he's guarding the palace or something.

At lunch, Dan noticed several chickens out and realized he never shut up the opening of the steer pen in the back of barn, thus opening the flood gates to curious chickens who love to wonder. So once again, our yard was filled with chickens, which was a flashback to a time when I did let them wonder. Of course they avoided the flower beds this time of year....had it been a couple of months ago, when I wanted the flower beds to look nice, they would have decided to dig up flowers and create holes to dust bathe in, but yesterday they didn't go past the mowed off garden, probably enjoying the rotting spoils hidden in grass and weeds.

I don't know if Carl watched them from his stroller or not. I pushed him through the yard several times walking back and forth from that grown fence line there in the picture above, as I was cleaning out my flower beds and throwing the old flowers there. Whether he was or not, he seemed to enjoy is afternoon ride...

as the chickies seemed to enjoy their day out!

                                                                                        ...cluck... cluck... cluck...