Egg Stash

I was letting out the chickens one morning awhile back. And feeding them. It was also raining that day.

The first thing I saw was a single egg sitting in the middle of one of the runs. The hens don't usually lay eggs out in the open. I somehow missed it the day before. I had probably locked up the chickens after dark and didn't think to look down the run.

Later I decided to walk around to see how much grass was in the run and if I needed to move the fencing. You may remember that I try to move the fencing after it rains.

Then I saw it. A pile of eggs! Just sitting there in the tall grass. Just a few feet from where I walk all the time. Waiting to be found. Thirteen eggs! All exactly the same size and shape and color. All from the same hen.

I'm wondering how she got out at least 13 days without me noticing she was outside the fence. And I'm amazed that nothing had disturbed them in that period of time.

Then I turned around and happened to notice something under the coop. More eggs! How do I not notice them? What is going on?

One reason is that most of the eggs are brown and there were lots of dead leaves on the ground that look the same color. But still.

Then I remembered it had been a full moon the night before. I'm convinced it's the moon.

I had to put these eggs in the fridge (remind yourself here why I don't usually refrigerate the eggs) because they had been washed by the rain, and I also wasn't sure how old they all were. We kept these eggs for our own use and ended up eating them all because they were all fine.

(The eggs in the last photo show the stash on the left and the others I found under the coop and in the run on the right. Notice how identical the ones on the left are.)