Grrrrrrrrrr

[Gem]

One of my bantys is a lovely little thing who lays every other day (like clockwork), is a little cuddle monster and generally a pleasure to have around the place.

The silkie banty is, however, another story. She doesn't lay, she takes delight in ignoring my 'chicken defences' which is a mini fence around the veggy patches and constantly 'nags' for treats. She has killed 4 tomato plants, 2 butternuts, a cucumber and a courgette plant so far.

This is just a mini rant. All but two of the tom plants were killed today!!!

I still love having them but next year I will be seeding with the intention of growing about a dozen more plants for Woo to pull out and fling around!!!
I am rapidly going through all my spares which I generally enjoy giving away!

Rant over

Gemx

[Thomzo]

Hmmmm, chicken soup?

Zoe

[Gem]

Haha, I menthioned that but technically she is the OH's so he is not so keen on the idea!

[Flo]

Technically then all the chicken soup will be his

[liskeardjane]

a pen? you can let them out when supervised and then get them back in - kind of free range ?

[JulieSherris]

We have a fence around our veggy patch... it started off being just 3ft high as a basset defence & then was added to using windbreak netting to height of 5ft. So far, so good & with 40 something birds free ranging, the defences haven't been breached more than once or twice... yet!!

[MKG]

Show her a cleaver and gently but firmly explain what it does. Do the same thing with OH and gently but firmly explain how much a miscreant chicken is worth, weight for weight, in missing vegetables.

Bantam - I'd say about 5 lbs of prime tomatoes. One plant, in other words. She's living on borrowed time and chicken casserole is a favourite of mine.

Mike

[Keaniebean]

It's frustrating when that happens. I got so cheesed off with the chickens destroying my little plot that I had hubby build them a 6 foot high enclosure. Mind you we then didnt get any eggs for over a year

We threatened them with the chop earlier this year and amazingly one of them is now laying again.

[Gem]

Haha love all the suggestions. Particularly MKG's. Think my neighbours will think I am a bit nutty though!

The chooks have a run but its quite small and I dont have the space to make anything bigger so I really prefer them having the run of the place. I have tried building full border defences but am limited by the stone wall. It's foundations mean it is difficult to build the defences flush against the wall so they just keep getting in. As I have a relatively small patch and they seem to leave the bigger plants alone I am going with individual wire tubes for the smaller plants. All the toms are dead now but the squashes are safe in their tubes so heres hoping it works.. I am going to have a really good think before I plant out anything else!