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This note is for Michelle…and other chicken lovers.
And seeing a few winter photos will be welcome in the hot summer temperatures…

The comfort is that some independent chickens find ways to be safe away from the coop. Sally decided last summer that she wasn’t a chicken at all; at least she no longer wanted to live with those other birds. For a while, she camped out in the lower sheep barn, where she brooded in a corner of the feed room. She had no rooster for company and no eggs hatched….so eventually she gave up on the project.

When winter came (as you can see from the photos), Sally moved to the upper sheep barn where she slept with the sheep and followed us around whenever we were there. She was (and still is) quite the picture trotting along beside us when we arrive, asking us clearly to give her some breakfast. She has no fear of the dogs and happily they are very polite to her. One day this summer, Sally even came into the horse corral to get me, and led me back to the barn clucking insistently. For her part, she definitely knows her name and comes when she is called.

When the sheep come out for hay, she goes into the winter pen and nibbles along with them. Here she is about to go around Finn, our youngest Border Collie.

If she slept outside, I would worry, but she has always sought some sort of cover. These days, Sally perches at night on the wall of the sheep’s sleeping area. But last winter, she slept down with the sheep, buried in wool to stay warm.

Sally stars in the skirting part of this spring’s Shearing Day video (about 3 minutes into it), and if you carefully study the last frame or two, you will see the silhouette of a chicken standing on a sheep’s back in the big open door!

We love Sally and hope that she lives with us for many years….