This morning I truly thought Butterscotch was on her last legs. She's always first out of the coop but when I opened up the hatch there was no sign of her. Whilst the other two tucked into breakfast she was still hunched inside in classic 'sick chicken' pose. A quick check over revealed nothing obvious apart from runny poos (sorry, too much information I know!) but thinking the worst I dashed to the shops for pro-biotic yogurt (in case it was sour crop) and we managed to get some into her beak. An hour later she wasn't interested in food or water and so we gave her some olive oil in a pipette (in case she had a blockage somewhere). Still no improvement.

At 11ish I went out (on a wool gathering expedition to Jolie with fine company in the form of Gina and Val) and when I returned there was this…

on the floor of the house and a bit bashed from the drop (she'd laid it from her perch)! I'd like to say I don't know who was more surprised, but judging by her expression I think it was Butterscotch!

… on our first week of chicken keeping:

:: I had no idea they poohed SO much!

:: I knew I was going to enjoy having them around but I wasn't prepared for how maternal I feel towards my girls!

:: My bedtime reading this week has been Starting with Chickens by Katie Thear and Keeping Chickens by Rebecca Hillman at Sallygardens.

:: Chickens get a bad press when it comes to brain power. They're actually more intelligent than you might think – they worked the ladder out very quickly and you should see them clustered around the back door waiting for Amy to get home from school and give them their handful of corn!

:: Chickens are lovely, but seriously – how much poo?!!!!

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Footnote: Thanks to all of you who have emailed about knitted animals. I am slowly getting back into my groove and hope to have some ready to list on etsy soon – will send more details shortly.