In late October 2024, our 13 hens were in full molt, a.k.a. naked of feathers, and no more eggs on the horizon until the skies begin to brighten in the spring. Which I had in mind when I considered the following…

We ended up rehoming Toey to a friend of a friend. I have been told that she settled into her new home seamlessly. Here at Darwin’s View, her absence was felt most by her former BFF Flopsie, the hen who kept Toey company through her pecking-order trials. With Toey’s departure, Flopsie plummeted to the bottom of that pecking order; in the chicken world, no good deed goes unpunished.

Hop aboard! Here is the daily morning Chicken Train. Very endearing and deceptive given how mean they are still being to Toey . . . though she has, with trepidation, dared to sleep on the roosts again.

Toey is our best mother hen. She is consistently and obnoxiously broody. Unfortunately, when we later put Toey and her seven pullets together with the twelve other hens, they accepted the babies, but not Toey. Drama ensues.