Happy hens

Hello Bloggers.
Since the last posting we've only had 2 phone calls. One was Rocky, the black lab we caught and returned home one day - out for another wander in exactly the same area. At least that was easy to pin down. The other from an author publishing a book about dogs that go missing. He wanted to meet up to interview us and sounded harmless enough and is going to call back tomorrow (I was in a meeting at the time he called) but after Jon & Shelley's experience we certainly wouldn't meet him at home, and will be cagey about any personal details if we do decide to meet up.
Since Sky went missing I've found a need to care for something (obviously Tim doesn't count ;-) ) so a month ago I found myself inheriting 3 male calling ducks. Then I discovered the Battery Hens Welfare Trust and to cut a long story short Tim and I and our friend Pat found ourselves picking up 5 hens near Coventry yesterday. They are rescued from certain slaughter because their egg production has gone below 1 per day, even though they are only 17 months old and have another few years left in them. They're in a very sorry state, with pecked feathers, droopy combs, weak legs, and are totally bewildered at seeing daylight or being able to walk. One of them is skeletal in terms of feather loss. Quite upsetting.
Apparently within 2-4 weeks they'll be transformed and confident.
While we were there a man saw the missing Sky poster in our Jeep and said "haven't you found him yet?". He came from Ashby de la Zouch, 40 miles from where we were, and 10 miles from our home, but knew all about Sky. That was nice.
Seeing another Jeep Cherokee with a happy dog in the back on Friday evening driving home from a very hard week's work wasn't so nice, and set me off crying again.......
But the Ashby man said he knew a dog who had been stolen then returned many months later when a vet scanned his chip, so we live in hope still, and may put another advert in the Veterinary Times.
Anyway, the BHWT is an amazing organisation of volunteers who rescue these hens and if any of you are interested the website is http://www.bhwt.org.uk/
If you can't look after any hens, please do visit the website and let it persuade you never to buy eggs which aren't free range - if you still do.
One of my girls laid an egg on the way home, which I had for breakfast this morning. I was dead chuffed!
Thanks to Helen for the offer of company for July's fitness campaign. Please phone or text on the numbers at the top of the blog, and we can link up. If anyone else wants to join in with some walks please contact us. Thanks. Ffion.