Early morning musings ( I must get back to work!)

June 15th

We had friends around last night who commented on what we had done in a short space of time in our garden. “Oh, you've taken the fence down” and “The hedge has gone” were two comments. It made me realise how insular our lives become when we garden obsessively. These poor friends have not been over for months because we've been squirrelling away, “doing the gardening” and so only vaguely remember what the garden was like before. The fact that we had neither a fence nor a hedge got me thinking that I must put on a 'before and after' set of photographs for them to remember it by. (Actually, they all gave me stick for doing a blog because it's me talking about me again, Friends, I am sorry!) The good thing is, they don't have to read it and I will leave that job to the few loyal family members I have; Mum and Gayle, thank you!

Having let the chickens out slightly earlier (we usually open their hen house door at 7am) I was greeted with the 'thud, thud, THUD' of the three of them hopping down off their perch. The last one down is always Shakira who we think probably weighs half as much again as the tiniest of the trio. Shakira was so named because she made such a lot of noise (like the singer) when we first had her but now, apart from when she is inquisitive as to what we may have for her to eat (when she makes a low “babababa” noise) or when she is disturbed by something ;usually Jack's cat, Socks, strolling nonchalantly past on her way to our back door and then she squawks wildly. Actually, I just glanced up from the dining table where I am writing my blog to witness Buck Bucky (the oldest hen and top of the pecking order) chasing away the much bigger magpies. Hens will happily share their food with tiny birds, such as sparrows and robins right up to wood pigeons which are hugely fat right now but they will not tolerate the magpies. So, for those huge birds it has to be a quick smash and grab before they get chased off. To see a small hen chasing away a large, nonplussed magpie is quite amusing. The magpie will hop a few feet away until it tires of being bothered by a petulant hen and makes off for the trees, cawing as it goes. Our 'girls' then get back to the job of picking up any stray seeds the messy sparrows have dropped from the bird feeder above. There is a little patch of scratched away earth directly underneath the feeder from daily foraging and should the hens spy a feeding bird whilst they themselves are elsewhere it is quite comical to see them all leg it to reach the rich pickings first. Sweetie, the youngest and littlest of our chicks, has a lop sided run and frequently has to flap like mad to keep herself from overbalancing. She is like an old lady at the bring and buy sale, all 'elbows' as she races along.

The blue tits have their own feeders, full of peanuts which the magpies also raid whilst he wild bird seed feeder attracts finches and dunnocks and the goldfinches are catered for with niger seed which they seem to love. The ground feeding birds,; robins, doves and wood pigeons join our girls to clear away the mess the others have made. It's an economic program, no waste and they all seem to be happy enough about it.