Chickens in the Trees

Tina Tyzzer of Indiana looked around for her chickens the other day -- and found them looking down on her!

"I heard the chickens behind me yesterday and looked around to see no one…until I looked up in the tree," she writes. "Guess they were taking a rest from free-ranging to tree ranging!"

Her chickens are an Ameraucana cross that lay green eggs. That makes it obvious when there's some egg envy going on.

"Our chicken eggs were disappearing," she writes. "The chickens were laying eggs where the lettuce leaf is and we would go to collect them and they wouldn’t be there. This turkey hen was rolling them over into her own nest…all the green ones are CHICKEN eggs! All of the turkey hens were doing this, so we were losing most of our chicken eggs…I think we have it under control now though and the chickens are again laying in their boxes where they should be. "

The turkey hen in question is Turkey Girl, who was featured in the October/November issue of Backyard Poultry magazine. She's a Royal Palm, a small heritage breed turkey. They are so pretty, some keep them as ornamental birds.

Tina is also watching over a robin's nest. "It's right outside our garage on top of all of my Tomato cage poles," she writes. "We have changed our route to the garden, so we don’t disturb her every time we walk past, 20 times a day. Guess we won’t be putting up tomato cages for awhile!"

All these feathered friends are keeping Tina entertained. "As you can see, all of my 'girls' are very busy this time of year!" she writes.

Thanks, Tina, for sharing these stories with us.