After careful review of the laying hen losses that we have recently sustained, it seems that the 4-legged weasel may not have been the only kind that came sniffing around.
Almost all of our golden comets are gone – they are great foragers and roam all of our acreage in search of food.
With these challenging economic times, we now suspect that a 2-legged weasel may have appropriated them for their own household.
We put all remaining hens into the greenhouse last night. I setup “temporary” roosts for them, and will make more permanent ones tonight.
We also put the electric poultry netting around the greenhouse, which provides them with a fair amount of forage area. The best part of this, is that they are contained in the back acreage out of sight.
Fortunately, we have other laying hens growing up right now – the unfortunate part is that they are only 3 weeks old, and will not reach laying age until 5 months old – so we will be struggling at this point to provide all of our customers with the eggs they want.
–Pat