There’s chickens behind me, aren’t there…
Titus has done really well with the chickens, considering he’s just a 6-month-old puppy still.
I’m just going to ignore them.
Still there, aren’t they…
We started by just having him out there during the day so that we could check on him. We put his favorite toy – a cottage cheese container – in the pen with him and gave him a little chew treat each morning when we took him out. At night we would shut all the chickens in the shed and bring him back up to the house.
I’ll just lie down and continue ignoring them.
They’re maybe sort of entertaining…
When I left him in the pen the first morning, he didn’t seem to mind too much. He didn’t whine and pace like Ike did on his first morning in the pen.
But I’m still ignoring the one right behind me.
I wonder if chicken butts smell like dog butts
After about a week, we switched to have him with the chickens at night. They were getting pretty crowded being shut in the shed at night. Our main predator problem is owls, so it’s crucial to have Titus out there if we’re leaving the shed open at night. Unless we start having a daytime predator problem (hawks), he gets to come back up to hang out with Ava during the day.
Oh, so you’re leaving now?
We’ve only lost 1 chicken on his watch so far. It was early on, and I suspect he might have played too hard with one. Matt went out to do chores and didn’t notice it at first. Titus walked back and forth from Matt to the chicken until Matt noticed, and then was sniffing and licking the chicken and acting perhaps a bit guilty. But at least he didn’t eat it, and it hasn’t happened again so hopefully he learned to be more gentle with the birds.
All right, I’ll just lie here and wait for you to come back
Sometimes when I sneak up on him, I find him napping with a chicken snuggle buddy.
I’d say he’s getting along just fine.
3 years ago:
