Peggy & Her New Friend (Me!)

It was a big day for Peggy today - she was, at last, going to be allowed out of her cat crate. She stood at the door of the hen house for a few moments and then decided to venture out into the sunshine. It truly was a lovely moment, I felt quite emotional.

Peggy made her way to where the soil is dry - Cornelius and a few of his ladies were sunbathing. One of our bantams decided that Peggy wasn't going to join their little soiree and tried to attack her. I just walked between the two of them. Peggy followed me to the gate, where she stood for a moment before turning and going to get a drink of water.

The weather was good so I took the opportunity to plant some herbs in my herb garden. Before I knew it a couple of hours had passed.

I decided to check on Peggy, I walked through to Peggy's run and decided to sweep up some loose sand which had been kicked out from their sandpit. I sat down for a moment and who should come over ..... Peggy!

Pretty soon she had climbed onto my knee and gently lay down. Within a quarter of an hour she was snoozing - and so was I. Occasionally, Cornelius would come over to check I was behaving myself. He is a very gentle cockerel - a truly lovely lad!!! When he could see everything was OK he would wander off, have some pellets or eat some of the greens I had brought in for them.

After an hour I decided I needed to get on with other jobs. I got up and put Peggy onto the area in front of the hen house, which is paved over.

Looking at her sunbathing, I wondered she had earlier felt reassured by my presence or if it was simply that I looked a comfortable place to rest - but it was a lovely time to spend together.

I cannot help but remember that these hens were destined to be made into tinned pet food. Every day I get pleasure from watching these little hens and I thank Carly the lady from North London Hen Rescue who made it all possible for these little hens to enjoy life as it should be - scratching around the soil, enjoying the sun on their backs.