For years I have braved the cold to put out birdseed and suet cakes for the wild birds, congratulating myself on my generous nature. Now I don’t know if you remember Dr. Evil’s insistence on obtaining a new brood of hens late last winter, but well, that happened. Throughout this process, I have employed my world-famous worrying skills about every aspect of this endeavor. After we lost one hen when she didn’t return after free-ranging, we decided to keep them contained in the coop and the (very generous) run, lest they be gobbled up by neighborhood foxes, hawks and coyotes. My consolation to them was awesome treats:squash, scratch, mealworms, lettuce, and since Thanksgiving: bacon grease, almonds and cranberries.
Since the end of Daylight Saving Time, their egg production has faltered. Apparently, hens want ~14 hours of light to lay eggs. We run about 9.5 hours of daylight right now, so egg production is down from about 4 eggs per day to, uh, 1-ish per day. Which, as Terry “The Toad” Fields would say is, “typical.” I mean who doesn’t want more eggs in August than in January?? Today was our first substantial cold/snow day, and the ladies declined to even emerge from their coop. I have a very lavish, secure new coop design in my head right now, but it probably won’t be started until the spring, so every day in between, I worry about our five girls. kind of like I used to worry about the cardinals and finches back in the day.
In summation, now I worry about the wild AND the domestic birds.