Keeping hens the easy way

I spent last week looking after my neighbours' chickens. The neighbours were, of course, away. I didn’t just get a yen to enter their house, pass them at breakfast and start nursemaiding the livestock.

And it was such fun! But perhaps I just had it easy.

They (the hens) live within the wire-fenced confines of a secure, roofed compound. When their owners are at home, they roam the garden during the day. The door to the roosting box can be raised and lowered by a rope from outside the pen, but actually I was instructed just to leave it open.