The mulch is spread, the compost is made, the leaves are down, and today comes the rain. It's almost like nature knows when to happen... ;)
Today's daily chicken is a disinterested Koekoek. And Red. And Sweet Goldy. All busy doing chicken things.
It looks to me like their compost operation is ready to be harvested. We've added about two feet of leaves in here since August when we started with chickens, and now there's about five inches of stunning soil in the run. I'm torn as to whether I should leave it and move the chickens, or move it and leave the chickens.
As y'all know, my chickens are illegal imigrants here. I'm allowed to have ten chooks in city limits, provided their coop is 100 feet (35m) from a home or gathering area. Well, if I put them in the food forest without a nominal coop, I wonder what would happen... With no coop, they'd sleep in trees and bushes. The new six are stubborn and sleep outside anyways, despite my incessant urges to the contrary.
Just a little thought I've been toying with. Yeah, they'd have less shelter from predators, and that's a big consideration. As the forest matures, that would be less of a concern. They'd be able to be part of a more integrated system too, and their badass composting would happen in place on a larger scale. I dunno. It's bigly against traditional agricultural models, but so is everything else that's permaculture, so...
Things like that are fun to ponder.