We can handle some winter chicken scratching in the garden, but a minor nuisance becomes potential crop loss once peas are in the ground and seedlings are coming up. Meanwhile, it seems futile to feed hens if they're hiding caches of eggs under the bee hive or in the goat manger...especially since those infertile eggs won't hatch without a rooster around.

So I've been whittling away the worst offenders, putting them in the old tractor where they can't get into trouble. Three down, at least one more to go...but that last hen is hiding her nest in the barn and I haven't found it yet. Maybe this weekend I'll manage to track her clucking back to its source?

Want more in-depth information? Browse through our books.

Or explore more posts by date or by subject.

About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.



Want to be notified when new comments are posted on this page? Click on the RSS button after you add a comment to subscribe to the comment feed, or simply check the box beside "email replies to me" while writing your comment.

Powered by Branchable Wiki Hosting.