Little Green Space
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Little Green Space |
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LITTLE GREEN SPACE Originally published in the Peak Advertiser on 19 October 2009
One of Amanda Mee’s amazing owls visits Matlock. Birds
and butterflies featured strongly on the agenda at the recent Eco Day at
All Saints Junior School in Matlock. There
were many stalls and activities for children and adults to enjoy,
including building bird nesting boxes, constructing an insect hotel,
making bird feeders and extending the composting areas. My
colleague Amanda Mee brought along owls and hawks for children to hold,
and Little Green Space donated a tree to the school, which was planted
during the afternoon. We also
held a butterfly hunt and quiz in the school’s award-winning
conservation area. Prizes for this quiz – a bird nesting box and bird
feeder – were kindly donated by Two Dales-based Johnson-Ladygrove Ltd. The
event was a big success. And birds and bugs will really benefit from all
the hard work put in on the day to create many new habitats. A
trip to the farm Talking
of birds, our original flock of three hens are into their second year now
and should be producing eggs reliably for a couple more years. However,
egg production does gradually decline as the birds get older, and we have
become so used to the taste of freshly-laid free-range organic eggs that
we decided it would be wise to replenish our flock sooner rather than
later. So as
September rolled round, we took a trip over to Little Morton Farm in We spent
some time looking at the hens and trying to decide. Eventually we settled
for one of each: black, brown, white, and speckled-grey. The
children chose each bird individually. “One of the white ones,
please,” was not quite good enough; a particular white bird had caught
their eye, and that was the one they wanted. It was quite amusing to watch
owner Tom chase and pick up several birds before catching the correct one.
“No, not that one, that one!” insisted the kids, pointing. The
process was repeated with the other three hens, and then all four were
safely stowed into the cat carrier and cardboard box we had brought along
with us. Tom had
told us that some of the white hens were laying already, and to prove him
right the white bird laid an egg on the journey home. This was an
impressive start! In the car, we discussed names. My usual suggestions of
Pie, Curry, Casserole and Nugget didn't even raise a smile (not
surprisingly), just a lot of eye-rolling. Finally
the kids selected Sooty, Henrietta (Hetty for short), Daisy and Misty:
fine names for fine hens. New
kids on the flock A little
care is needed when introducing new birds to an existing flock. It is no
good to just shove them all in together and hope for the best. They need
time to get used to each other. The new chickens were kept contained in
their own separate house and run for a couple of weeks. This is partly so
they know where to go to roost and to get food and water, and also to give
Rosie, Bramble and Holly – the original flock – a chance to get used
to the invasion of new birds. The old
girls did seem a little alarmed at first – there was a lot of
disapproving clucking going on – but soon settled down. And the
new birds have settled well, too. We have had to "teach" them to
roost, though – a problem we did not have with our first hens. At dusk
on the first evening, the new birds didn't go up the ladder to roost but
just clucked around the pen in a slightly panicky way. So we lifted them
up into the roosting area. They were a bit drowsy, and easy enough to pick
up. We
figured they'd find their way down in the morning, to get food and water,
and would therefore be able to work out where to go the next night. We
repeated the process for the next couple of nights, and soon they had got
the hang of going to bed. How
to train a chicken We went
to visit the hens every day, and offered them tasty treats: sweetcorn,
pasta, grain and cheese. We did this with our first lot of hens, with the
result that they now come running expectantly whenever they hear the latch
on the orchard gate. Consequently, they are incredibly easy to catch –
useful when we want to put them away early because we are going out for
the evening and won’t be home until after dark. The same
tactic has worked well on the new hens too. After two weeks we released
them into the orchard and they now come running with the others as soon as
we appear at the gate. Although
Sooty and Hetty are still a little nervous they are becoming more
confident every day. And
Daisy, the white bird, is extraordinarily tame. In fact she’s more like
a cat than a chicken. She approaches us for treats and if there aren’t
any going we she’s happy to be stroked. I think she would happily sit on
our laps in front of the fire (with the real cat) if we let her. Rosie,
Bramble and Holly have tolerated the arrival of the new birds remarkably
well. There was a little bit of bullying to start with but now that a new
pecking order has been established, they all seem to be getting along just
fine. It is
lovely to watch them scratching around in the orchard, hunting for tasty
morsels, or sunbathing in the autumn sunshine. There is no doubt that
happy hens lay the tastiest eggs – and soon we will have more eggs than
we know what to do with! Penny
at Little Green Space www.littlegreenspace.org.uk |
