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Saturday, February 18, 2017

Edith and Mary Square Off (Blog 334)

With our heritage Rhode Island Red chickens, Elaine's task is to name the hens.  With our flock, she decided to have a Downton Abbey theme naming our hens Mary, Violet, Edith and Daisy.  In a case of the chicken yard imitating life, Mary lately has been picking on Edith, running her away from the feeder and waterer.

I can understand that as chickens have a pecking order that must be settled among themselves.  But Mary has taken to running Edith out of the hen house at night when the hens and their rooster Al are trying to fly up to the roost.  This is unacceptable as Elaine and I have to wait long minutes in the dark for Mary to stop the bullying.

Tonight, I became weary of Mary running Edith out.  So I picked up Mary, put her in the yard, put Edith in the hen house, and then removed the gangplank running to the house.

Now it was Mary's turn to panic as she was on the outside wanting in.  She was unable to fly up to the door. I let Edith become settled inside then I put Mary inside.  Hopefully, I will only have to do this a few more times before the nightly nonsense stops.

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