nat nah, nah nah n nat nah

the great escape 

(by the way, if you sing nah nah etc. it should sound like the music to the Great Escape film) but you do need a bit of imagination.

Wake up Horace, the chickens are escaping !!! or exclamations to that effect.

chickens, if you hadn't guessed already

Lazy kind of laid back old man that I am, I had noticed a few days (weeks more like) ago, that the gate on the hen run was a little rotten, and some of the wooden slats had sort of come a bit loose. They were attached at the top, but were swinging around a bit at the bottom, not thinking of course that chickens might have brains I just left it until another day to fix. Today must have been the great escape day, they all went for a wander round the garden, apart from the cockerel (no brain, I suppose) so here's a couple of pics, taken between the thunder storms we have been having this afternoon. 

are you trying to tell me something dear ?

The white ones are pure bred light Sussex, the cockerel is BIG, but a really handsome guy. He has only got the four wives, which I suppose is enough when you come to think about it. Perhaps he didn't escape cos he didn't have the energy !! or perhaps he was enjoying a quiet lazy afternoon to himself. 

The black ones are crossbred Sussex and some rare black French breed, so I was told, it's the black ones that lay the most eggs and it's the white ones that insist on sitting on them.

The last chickens I had were pure bred Marans, which come from Marans of course, they were big black girls and prolific layers. Marans, by the way, is a town on the coast just a bit north of La Rochelle, on the west coast of France. Some of the old girls died of natural causes, others because I gave them to my mate Michel to "do", actually it was his wife who "did" them, she oven prepared them for us and she kept some for payment. It's always nice when you can exchange services or goods like that. Every year we have an excess of apples, so I give them to the apple juice lady Opheline, and in return she gives us bottles of juice. The other day I renewed my mates breaks on his car, he is laying some concrete for me next week. No need for much money really.  Life's Good.