Peas for Brains

 We are camped in the middle of a farmers corn field.  #1 son's acreage is surrounded by a farmers fields.  Every year their scenery changes as the crops are rotated.

I somehow got Terri into my reading list, which I assume is like inbox at Multiply.  At least I could find it and read her last two blogs about sayings and school lunches.  Yahoo.  I could also find my blog to read comments and see all the mistakes in it that I will not bother to fix.  The spacing between words went funny after I added an extra picture.  I feel like I still have peas for brains.  I found my way back here but don't have time this morning to journal about Manitoba. 

Instead I will tell about these chickens here at my son's house.# 1 son and his wife heard about an egg factory that was giving away hens or planning to slaughter them as they had laid for a a year and were slowing down.  So they quicky built a coop of old pieces of lumber, and a free run to keep out the raccoons and foxes around here and went to get 6 of them.  The grand-girls named them Bobbie, Billie, Sandra......   The hens didn't know how to forage which is just plain cruel.  They wouldn't come out of the coop, wouldn't fly up to the roosts or nesting area and slept in a pile on the floor.  They laid eggs on the floor and their combs were pale pink and droopy.  I just looked out and noticed that three were actually at the end of the run doing the peck-peck thing.   They are eating seeds off of the weeds too.                                                                            This was a picture from last week when they were pushed out of the coop and the door shut for a half hour to make them stay outside for awhile.  They had never seen grass or the sun.  Pretty sad-looking, scrawny chickens they were.  Now the door is only closed at night and they come and go freely and their combs are looking brighter red but still limp.  They still sleep in a pile on the floor but maybe that is better than a single-celled cage of wire.   Just the way they move now is a delight to watch.  I sometimes am in despair about our big farming methods to feed the masses.  I will take an after picture before we head back west.