"Janet Baraclough.." wrote in
message ...
The message m
from Tim Challenger "timothy(dot)challenger(at)apk(dot)at" contains
these words:


House-trained hens.

Unfortunately the birds pick around the meadows and under the pear
trees
across the road but rarely come over to us. So I can't take advantage
of
their unofficial deposits. I might be seen sneaking around after them
with
a trowel during the hours of dusk though....

The place to look is in the shed where they sleep at night, under
their roosting bar, on the dropping board. It's called "the dropping
board" for a very good reason :-)

Indeed, although it is pretty much impossible to measure I would think
they drop more overnight then during the day outside, mine at least seemed
to. I used to add new straw regularly and just have a big clean out now
and again, one huge steaming pile in the greenhouse attached to the
chicken house and that provided additional heating as well.


--

Chris Thomas
West Cork
Ireland