Wet chooks!

Look at this crazy wet chook! Unbelievable!

We have been having heaps and heaps of rain... like the back yard is flooded, am emptying the pool 3-4 times a days, everything is damp inside... lots of rain. The chickens get to come out and scratch around every day and when it is raining, I still let them out, thinking that they will use their brains (do they have one?) and scratch under the trees and bushes.

But no!!!! My chooks are out in it, absolutely drenched. I went out the back door to the car to pick the kids up from school and there they all were, all looking like this... I laughed and laughed and laughed. It was a very funny thing to see... Usually so fluffy and big, these scrawny chickens looked a treat... Couldn't wait to tell the kids, who in turn couldn't wait to get home to see these crazy chickens.

Rang my Dad: God, Dad. These chickens, they are all wet and dripping. Will they be all right? Will they get a cold? Will I need to dry them off before bed time? (imagining myself with the hair dryer well into the night, drying off these bedraggled chickens!) No love. They like it in the rain, it's like a bath for them. They enjoy it. They'll be right.

Actually, typing that in, I haven't actually heard any cluck clucks this morning from them, I had best go and check on them... might be chicken for dinner if they have all fallen off the perch during the night. Ooooh yuck!

Anyway, by the time we got home they had worked their way down to the front gate and were wallowing in the water, up to their chicken knees in it... Like they NEED to scrounge around for food, like they are NOT the best fed chickens in the world, desperate for that last little wormy before bedtime.

I have to say, these chickens get the scraps from my kitchen and the tuckshop kitchen AND seed and pellets every day, plus anything else they scratch up in the yard. They should be plump, ready for cooking, not scrawny and sinewy like a drowned cat.

I love my chickens. I do hope they are OK.... Oh dear... I'm off to check on them...