THE refugee hen from my daughter’s hen house has had a shock this week, as have the rest of the hen house’s inhabitants.

Eight refugee chickens have also claimed asylum in the hen hut. All have escaped a chicken cull that took place when their capacity for laying a sufficient number of eggs of the right size for a commercial egg production unit diminished.

These chickens have led a life protected from the vagaries of the outside in a purpose-built environment. Their nutrition assured by a scientifically calculated feed ration. Water always accessible and potable in proper drinkers. Their daylight waking hours regulated by electric lights rather than the tilt of the earth’s axis. A chicken utopia in many ways. Free to roam about their spacious shed this would seem a chicken paradise.

So imagine their horror when they were brutally seized by a monster (John), and crammed into a cardboard box and taken straight to our hen hut where they were rather unceremoniously tipped out onto the straw and left to think about how lucky they were to escape being a chicken dinner.

Not that they understood any of that. To them it must have seemed that their world had gone topsy-turvey. For two days they have huddled in a corner of the hut, traumatised by the change. They have eventually discovered that there is corn on offer, but must consider it very plain after their tasty gourmet feed mix.

One of the hens fell into the bucket of water and I only just saved it from drowning. Two have retreated into the egg-laying boxes and refused to come out, leading to much frustration from our own hens who want to get in there to produce eggs.

But after I laid a tempting trail of corn down the entrance/exit ramp to the hut, four of the hens have ventured into the outside world. A vista of mud, grass and puddles they have never seen before.

I am hoping today to either tempt, or if I lose patience, eject the other hens into the outside world. They also have to learn to lay in the correct place. Just dropping an egg onto the floor of the hut is not approved of. These newcomers do look a sorry lot though, I must say.

As they were going into their first moult at the end of their productive egg laying period, most are only half feathered and look scrawny in comparison to our over fed, greedy, assorted mob of chucks. Give them six weeks of free range bliss, I won’t be able to tell the difference.