I got some help in the yard today, in the form of 6 happy hens.  There were other animals in the vicinity, but considering them “help” would have been a gross misconception.

I was trying to find the edges of the small round “clearing” in the back yard, which is really just a maybe 6ft across circle of not-as-much-grass.  There is a stump in the middle, where the apple tree was before we moved in.  Like, it was there until days before we moved in.  It apparently fell over.

It’s also where we buried the kittens, when Twink’s first litter got mauled by Lola-dog (not out of viciousness, but out of some strange mothering instinct).  They are buried between the catnip and catmint plants, so they get lots of visitors throughout the day.

Last year, before I lost my job, I had planted all sorts of ground-cover as well, hoping it would grow over the low stump and make sort of a fairy-circle there.  They did really well, until the weather changed and they stopped growing.  The grass and weeds did not stop growing, so it got messy.

So today, I started pulling up handfuls of weeds, throwing them into the chicken enclosure.  Eventually the chickens got brave enough to come help, scratching and tossing, eating bugs and slugs.  Oscar-pug didn’t care for it, tried to charge them a few times, but eventually decided to pee on the last patch of weeds instead, which effectively stopped my weeding project for the day.

Then I decided to go ahead and rearrange the chicken run, since a couple of the girls have decided to continue to lay eggs in the bottom of the coop.  Stoopid chikins.