Chicken Chasers and birthdays
In March of this year, I went out to Tractor Supply and bought four chicks—supposedly sexed–as I did not want to deal with a rooster. I don’t mind the crowing—we have a neighbor somewhere nearby that has a rooster—but roosters can be mean. Those four chicks rapidly grew into hens—clucking and cooing and surprising us with eggs about six weeks ago–much earlier than we had expected. These chickens were surprisingly cute during their entire childhood, adolescence and now adulthood. Unlike the previous set of chickens that flew the coop one day and resisted the efforts of Toby and Dora to be herded back into their rightful places, these chickens were never ugly.
Toby and Dora (Border collie/Lab and Border Collie/Aussie) kept a very close eye on these new chickens. One of the chickens always seemed to be by herself–and we worried a bit that it might be a rooster—but then we began getting four eggs every day–proving that we had four hens.
The loner chicken has escaped several times; over the fence, under the fence—and Dora was called to help round up the wanderer. One day last week, the wanderer escaped again and this time Toby found her—there were feathers everywhere—Dora herded her under the car—where I spied her squatting down behind the rear tire hoping no-one could see her. She was returned to the coop yard and the next day we had four eggs—she seemed none the worse for her adventuresome day.
We celebrated Glen’s birthday that day with a meal at a local Mexican restaurant—we don’t eat out much these days—but a margarita with a tiny sombrero suitably sized for one of Glen’s collection of turtles was fun along with a huge plate of shrimp nachos which we agreed would have been plenty for our meal.
Alas and Alack, one of the hens died—apparently this happens to chickens—and it was not the adventuresome one. We had only one egg today, I watched them all happily scratching away at the dirt and leaves in the side yard—keeping our fingers crossed.
It is silly to mourn over a dead chicken–they are not the brightest of creatures but they do make such a lovely cooing sound. They know when we open the side door and they come running when they see us—of course we have food and water to offer—-and we are enjoying all those wonderful fresh eggs.
Sylvia Weir Art 