Glorious weekend

What a stunning weekend we had.  The Winter has been unexpectedly cold the last couple of weeks but then we got a weekend like this.  The sky was clear blue and it was mild enough to be out in short sleeves as long as you kept busy.  And we were.  Mick was keen to get the chook house ready.

I went out to take some photos and noticed a magpie on the back fence with a few twigs in its beak.  I paused and watched where it went - up into the tree by our back door to continue nest building.  Looks like we will have baby magpies right there.  I was down at our old house yesterday and was thrilled to hear the kookaburras in the trees at the back of the block.  They nested there once about 4 years ago so it's lovely to find them back.

So here are some photos of outside our house.  There have been a few requests and I keep promising to take them.   The inside ones next time.  This house is right in the middle of our half acre block so there is plenty of space all the way round.  There is an old "dunny" out by the laundry door and a little garden shed beside that.  There was also a woodshed built on the side of the garden shed and that's what became our chook house.  It's worked out well.

Sunday afternoon we were ready for the feathered family so I drove off to collect them.  When we let them out of the crate one of the girls was a bit quiet.  This morning she didn't come out to eat and huddled in the house.  I had to return the crate to the breeder, who lives about 2 miles away, so rang and told her about the unhappy chook.  She said to bring her back and she would swap her for another.  Seems she was in shock. 

I returned with the new girl, tucked in our neighbours cat carrier, and discovered the breeder hadn't zipped the side up properly and I hadn't checked. I discovered this the hard way with one expensive free range chook!  I was certain we would never be able to catch her and having never been in our chook house she was hardly going to take herself to bed once it got dark.  I tried to get her heading to the back corner of the yard so she would be furthest from the road.  As she rounded the corner of our wonky carport the little rooster (named Wilbur) spied her.  He called frantically and the hen raced down to the chicken run.  Despite her best efforts she couldn't get in.  I couldn't open the gate as surely Wilbur and the other two girls would come out rather than the new girl going in.  She was keeping well away from me.  I rang Mick, who was down at our old house doing a little job, and he walked up the hill to come and help.  We got Wilbur and the girls into the house, blocked the pop-hole so they couldn't come back out, and opened the gate from the run into the backyard.  It took only a little bit of herding by us and a bit more calling by Wilbur to get the hen to run through the gate. When we released the others they ran out to join her.  One happy family.