Though I’ve opened the nursery every morning for over a week now, the pullets are still largely uninterested in coming out yet. This is not unusual; there was a flurry of activity on the first day which resulted in one of the pullets going missing, but since then they have stayed where they feel safe. That includes the missing one; Wednesday I needed to drive into Seattle, so I planned to let them stay in the nursery that day. But when I went out to check their food and water, whom should I find wandering around the chicken yard but the missing pullet, very hungry and very vocal, but otherwise none the worse for wear. I was able to catch her and put her in with the others, and there she has stayed since. I have no idea where she went; I spent over an hour looking for her the day she vanished, to no avail. My best guess is that she managed to get through the narrow gap under the ramp and had been hiding under the house for three days; even though I crawled under there with a flashlight as part of the search, it’s a large area and even a thorough, hours-long search wouldn’t have sufficed to peer into every space under there large enough for a pullet. I’m just glad I didn’t lose her, and choose to view her mysterious return as a good omen for this year.
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