Guard Duty Paid Off

Oh a very early entry today.  After only a couple hours of Buffy finally settling down Polly was off at 5am.  Very early for her and it was definately an alarm call shouting "Attention Everybody!".  Buffy hoofed it off the bed and this time I was right behind her.  There it was - foxy - I'm prone to slight exageration but this one was close, were talking less than 20ft away.

Buffy was straight out there and chased it off to the back of the garden and through a small gap in the fence (Kiwi will be straight onto that).  Polly calmed down a bit then but Buffy was hot footing it around the garden in a figure of 8 fashion, nose to the floor and snorting.  Corner to corner she ran then zig zagged her way back.  Once she'd checked our premises out she was through that gap just like foxy to make sure he had truly gone.  Actually, not exactly through the gap just like foxy, more of a tentative "can I get through there" sort of squeeze.  She's built for comfort (not fat, definately not fat), and while her shoulders went through with ease she had to wiggle her hips through.  She was determined though, she had work to do and wasn't going to let her figure put her off!

Our lovely chooks however were in glorious and total oblivian.  They're the ones at risk here but fortunately their stately home is as fox proof as you can get.  Ha ha, I was just going to say "I don't want to count my chicken's but".  You see, there are so many phrases that come out of these girls.

Well done Polly and well done Buffy - I'd rather have these broken nights of sleep and have all my girls safe than wake up one morning to find they've all been butchered!  I've put in too much work on these lovely things to let some fox take them for breakfast. 

You may think I've gone slightly peculiar but this to me is the best sight in the whole wide world (childish phrase I know but it's just how I feel).  This is Helen's bottom.  It's fully feathered now, a very different sight to December when she arrrived with us, red raw and not a bit of fluff in sight.  You can see at the top right of the photo there's still a little bit of her wing that isn't covered but that's all there is left to show for that terrible start to life that she had.