Old birds have their uses

Over the last few months every day we’ve been getting one egg from the established birds and one egg from the new girls.

I’ve always assumed them to be produced by Queenie (the youngest of the older girls by a year or so) and Holly (who is still so busy producing eggs she hasn’t yet grown all her feathers back).

This morning when I came out to clean the run and give the girls their breakfast, Princess Layer was no-where to be seen. Despite knowing the run is fox proof this always give me concerns, and if they’re still in the coop that could be a sign that they are ill.

I opened up the coop and sure enough there was Princess cosied up in a nest box. I left her to it, for all I knew she was just having a lie in. But then she started singing an egg song! (If you haven’t heard one they are quite an event).

A couple of minutes later she popped out to greet me (and have her share of breakfast) and there in her nesting box was a very warm freshly laid egg.

We should never make assumptions about productivity or effort based on age, everyone has the ability to contribute, and even old birds have their uses!