Assistant Gardeners!

Tea's enclosure has remained empty since she became fully weaned last October.  Up until February, we stored straw near our front door (in the small amount of shelter there).

Given the proximity of various fires at the beginning of the year, we shifted the remainder of the bale inside Tea's small house. It's proved quite useful to have it close to the Fox-proof Fowl Fort when we need to change the chookies nesting material.

I've been eyeing off the enclosure for a while now, considering it's potential as a small fenced garden for corn or a spreading crop. 

The FpFF needs moving to new ground but we'll do that next weekend.  In the meantime the girls can enjoy supervised scratching sessions in Tea's former yard, preparing it for my next growing endeavour!
 
Shifting the girls back and forth between enclosures was a funny exercise.  Judge Judy and Jo are used to being handled, so were easy to catch.  The "new girls" weren't greatly keen to be rounded up and presented some challenges to the chook-wranglers! 

All our girls seemed to like their change of scene.  By early afternoon they had trampled down several paths through the greenery and done other good work too.  I put a small box in the enclosure with some straw this morning, hoping the chookies would see it as a temporary nesting box.  Instead, they scratched all the straw from it and by mid afternoon several girls were pacing up and down the fence-line.  I called Vaughan to catch them.  In the process, he startled a small rabbit hiding in the green patch and it bolted under the orange plastic and away across the front paddock!  The chookies were quite startled by our cackling! 

Obsidian, Judge Judy and Mrs Floosit were caught first and returned to their usual abode.  Jo, Pooh II and Shadow followed.  Three eggs were gifted in quick succession (from Obsidian, Judge Judy and Jo) soon after the girls returned home!