Saturday I started picking up the pieces after the goat invasion. I had already removed the chewed up nest box, so I pitchforked out all of the old litter and threw down a fresh new layer to start the winter off. Cleaned up the feeder and filled it, and dunked the water can in a bucket to start soaking off the bird residue. There's a water trough just outside of their coop that the goats use, so they'll be able to get water.

A quandary when I came to the goat gate, which was sprung off of two of its hooks and had one spacer slat broken off. I decided that, since the birds were capable of flitting up into the rafters of the coop, they could fly over the bottom half of the main door to get into the coop. I tried this and they had no problem doing that.

Ahead: what to do with the coop. I have two choices. First, I could scrape off the walls and put up more chicken wire so they can't get into the rafters and bomb everything with their waste. Or I could build a straw bale chicken coop in another part of the yard, and surround it with goat fence so the goats don't eat it down to the ground. Whatever the case, I've got the winter to ponder the choice.

My wife says she misses the fresh eggs. Me, too.

From memory, at last count I had the following chooks still hanging in there: Hens: two buff orpingtons, a white leghorn, a barred rock, a silver laced wyandotte, the while Silkie/Cochin cross, and a couple of Red crosses. Roosters: Rhode Island Red, Silkie/Cochin Cross, the mystery Bantie, and two mutts, one kind of a calico cover, the other a rusty salt and pepper color. Then there's what is supposed to be an easter egger, but I can't tell what it wants to be. It has no pronounced comb, but it has longer tail feathers. I don't know. That looks like a count of fourteen to me.

McMurray Hatchery now has Marans, the breed that lays chocolate brown colored eggs. Add them to my list for spring: Cuckoo Marans (the hens resemble barred rocks), another set of New Hampshire Reds, and some easter eggers that I know for certain are hens, and easter eggers. Round out the balance of the order with meat birds, and I'll be set,

Until then, more work. And decision making.