Chicken Entertainment

As the days start rolling towards winter, daylight hours get shorter. For our chickens, this means more time in their run and supervised less free-range time outside their runs. I know that when winter is here, I'll be driving home from work in the dark and I won't be able to let them roam around outside after work. So we started thinking of several environment enrichment options. 

Food is generally the number one motivator and a way to keep them interested is to make a swinging treat. As you can see above, corn is a favourite and they all take turns pecking at the corn. It also takes a certain amount of coordination to peck at the swinging corn.

Same big hit in Penguin's run.

And the aftermath...

Clover weeds and grass are also a favourite, they can easily be collected, tied and hung up for them to peck at during the day. Clover incidentally is high in nitrogen, apparently that's why the chickens like eating them. Many Adelaide gardens are plagued by clover in winter, but sadly, up here in this part of the Hills, there seems to be hardly any clover around. Down in the plains, our chickens gorged themselves on clover during winter. I've also used wire to pierce through fruit and veg that can't be easily tied up. Just make sure that the end of the wire can't poke them.

That brings me to the next point. Chickens need greens in their diet and in a run they quickly run down any grass. In the above photo, there used to be lush grass growing there! In Penguin's run, any green gets gobbled up or scratched up quickly.  One way I've found to keep some greens growing is to use a mesh screen.

This is just chicken wire stretched over a frame. Beneath it, I sprinkle all the grain that the chickens toss out of their feeder. Lightly cover in soil and keep watered.

After a few weeks....

The chickens can peck at the greens, but can't scratch it up. I've got two in rotation at the moment, unfortunately the sprouted grains tend to die off after a while, so when that happens, I move the screen to a different location and start again. The chickens have a grand time digging up the soil underneath it.

Speaking of digging, that's another favourite pastime. They love digging through things, so when the hydrangeas needed to be dead headed, the spent flowers ended up in their runs.

And the same with Buffy's run

You should see those flowers today, they have been scattered all across the run.

Early on, we introduced this tunnel to Buffy's run and it quickly became a favourite hang out spot.  It's just a wire fence twisted to form a tunnel and covered in some shadecloth. They like sitting next to it, within it and perching on top of it.

 

I've noticed that they also like to roost, so I added a roost bar to Buffy's run. This also came as a handy spot to hang food for them. I also added a shaded area in the back corner and left that section sandy for them to dust bathe in.

It's another favourite hangout spot. Today when I came back home, they were all sitting under the shadecloth.

I've found that Araucana's are not that enamoured with perching, but I added one in Penguin's run anyway. This time I used a natural branch. This was the straightest one I could find that was long enough.

At least Penguin uses it, mainly for elevated crowing I've noticed. He likes to make sure his crow travels far and wide. Hmmm...just noticed all the spent corn cobs in this photo....

There are few more things I would like to do. One of them is a sheltered outdoor section for both runs so they don't get to experience too much cabin fever. The other thing is to get their coops ready for winter. None of them are insulated, but I'm going to wind proof them as much as possible.

Happy to hear any other ideas!