It is impossible to "Dog Whisper" Chickens

I had J home with me today.  Her school had a trip to an amusement park all day, which she was waffling about already, since she is not a roller coaster fan.  She came home yesterday crying with a painful, swollen knee.  I am concerned about her JIA recurring after nearly 4 years in remission, but that is for another post.  Last night, JP said point blank, "You should not go to an amusement park tomorrow and walk around for miles on that knee."

With anti-inflammatories in her system, she is feeling much better today.  I enlisted her help to sit on the veranda and paint the picnic table/benches.  They look great now!

 

While I had the green paint out, I decided to paint the door inside the barn that goes into the Chick-bit house.  The peeps and rabbit didn't seem to mind that I was working there, but several of the hens appeared completely put out.  They clucked and complained long and hard.

At first, I tried talking soothingly to them, like you might with a fussy baby.

Didn't work.

Then I "dog whispered" them.  You know that short, sharp "Ch!" that Cesar Millan uses to get the attention of the dogs he is training?  It works sometimes with my dogs, and I even use it on the girls on occasion.

Didn't work on the hens.

I yelled at them to "Shut yer corn holes!"

All that did was upset the peeps and bunny.

I chased them outside.

That worked for awhile, but they came back in twice as agitated.

I finally decided that the only viable option was for me to just paint as fast as humanly possible, and get the heck outa there!

So, it's not a great job, but the door is painted on the outside.  I need to clean and sand the inside of the door and varnish it at some point.

 

This has been just one more observation to prove that chickens don't have much in the brain department!