Sunday, July 10, 2011

Tashi - mystery solved!

Tashi is getting fat.  There is no other way to say it.  She has gained 20 pounds since coming to live at the farm.  Given how active she is, and that she gets only one cup of dog food a day, it was a real mystery.  I switched to low fat dog food, and still didn't see any difference.

My chickens eat a LOT of chicken feed - in fact so much that even at $4 a dozen for my free range eggs from chickens that get a special organic feed with no soy in it I am barely breaking even.

The nickel finally dropped.  Tashi eats chicken feed.  I have seen her do it while I am feeding out there, and I yell at her and she leaves the feed alone.  But the door to the chicken run is open all day, since I don't want to confine the chickens to their meager 1/8th acre run for their supply of grubs and worms.

Again, the nickel dropped.  I can be a bit dense sometimes, but I finally figured out what to do to keep Tashi out of the chicken run, but allow the chickens to get in and out at will.  Fortunately, Tashi is considerably bigger than a chicken.  I cut a tiny gate into the big gate, and it is big enough for the largest rooster to get through.  But Tashi cannot get in.

My chicken feed consumption is down.  Tashi is getting slimmer already.  Problem solved.




Poor, hungry Tashi!

2 comments:

  1. Give those dogs an inch.....:)
    I've got to remember to keep the gate to the vegetable garden closed. The peas are ripe now, and three dogs pulling on the pea pods can pull all the vines off the wire in no time, never mind how many of those pods they'll eat:(

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  2. That's a new one. My little terrier loves strawberries, but both dogs have left the peas alone - at least so far!

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