Lighting up the night

When we "fall back," it's always a dramatic change that leaves me a little depressed.  The days seem to shorten so much all at once and suddenly it's nearly dark when I get home from work.  This year, we've had the added dimension of figuring out what happens with the chickens during this time.  With their natural inclination to seek shelter and perch when darkness falls, they are trying to go to bed around 5:30 pm.  We have read that this leads to greatly reduced egg production, which we want to minimize since we are selling the eggs.  This weekend, Josh put the lights in the run on a timer, extending the day for the birds a little in the morning and a little in the evening to give them closer to a normal length of day.  This evening I went out after dinner to check on the girls and thought: how pretty the coop looks all a-glow...

Many of the birds were inside the henhouse, milling about, but a few were still out in the lit up run, eating and moving around.

So far, our egg production has remained fairly consistent.  We'll see how it goes as we move into winter.

There was also a gorgeous close-to-full moon tonight, low and bright.  As I went out to see the girls, it was just over the trees, lighting up the sky.  What a lovely night.