Hen Chronicles: It's all about food, always, at all times

While I was out cutting our overgrown lawn down to size the other day, I noticed that my noisy old lawn mower did not seem to frighten the hens, even when it passed within four feet of their pen. They did not run into their coop, or under it, as they do to stay cool on particularly hot days. Instead, they hung out in their pen, keeping a wary eye on things but holding their ground.

That’s when it hit me. To hens, obsessed as they are with food, virtually anything that moves is viewed as either a meal or a potential FDS (Food Delivery System), unless it obviously is a predator. Thus, a person, a wheelbarrow, a lawn mower - even a Dodge Ram 1500, for all I know - is a welcome sight to hens, who are continually baffled by the fact that finding new and improved ways to feed them is not the be-all and end-all of human existence.