Perhaps that's why they've been giving me such a hard time of late.

So to appease them and those of you who keep asking, here's a little insight into their present life.

You will remember not so long ago the chookies were waging a bit of a 'dinner-time' war with our border collie Molly.

Actually, they were double teaming her - not so fair really.

Chook A would bravely raid Molly's food bowl while Chook B would wait until she chased Chook A away to dart in and grab some scoffings. Then they simply swapped roles.

A genius plan really which often left Molly disgruntled and short a morsel or two of dinner offerings. Now that might not seem much of a deal to us but believe me it's a big thing when you love your food as much as Molly does.

Anyway, it seems the chookies have grown tired of the 'dinner-time' war or perhaps the gnashing teeth of a rabid border collie have finally scared the begeezes out of them enough to end these courageous raids.

But in the life of a chook when one door closes to a food supply, you simply go in search of another, right?

Enter our lovely old paddock horse Frank.

You see when it comes to eating his nightly Gumnuts, Frank is, well, not so careful and clean.

In fact, it could be said he spills more than he eats these days.

Our chookies have come to know that if you wait long enough under the feet of an old paddock horse, it rains Gumnuts... literally.

What's more, a slow-moving old paddock horse would rather just keep on munching than waste his time chasing away a couple of raiders cleaning up his scraps.

So for a little while at least it's a happy little family on the hill.

Frank nibbles away and the chookies peck as many fallen Gumnuts as they can possibly muster safe in the knowledge there will be no border collie-style gnashing teeth to worry about this time around.

Some things will never change on that hill though.

As Frank and the chookies dine out, not too far away you will find our two cats, content to sit and watch the goings on from a distance.

After all, why would you waste any effort walking over to fight with some chooks for a few scraps of Gumnuts when you're well aware the master you have wrapped around your little finger, ah, paw, will be putting out a smorgasboard of offerings in a minute or two.

Why work for your food when it's handed to you on a platter, right?

Spoilt those cats.

Maybe I should put their food beside Molly's bowl - the old gnashing teeth would surely sort them out.

Nah, who am I kidding, all pet owners know who rules the roost.