Chicken story continued

Matilda had three weeks on the newcomers, but she did not
appear to exert any dominance over them, including Comb, the rooster. Have you ever heard of the phrase “pecking
order”? It’s a real experience for
chickens, as the most dominant of the flock will literally peck at the less
dominant members to retain rights to eating and drinking first. It sounds a little middle school teenaged
boy-ish thing to me but it is part of the chicken reality. The rooster, if the
flock has one, gets to do whatever he wants, whenever he wants. So far he seems like a nice enough bird and
beautiful, at that, but I have been warned that if the rooster perceives you as
a predator he can attack you with his claws and hackles and serious injury can
occur – they go for your eyes. SO, whenever I go to the coop, I come bearing
gifts – a few slices of old bread, a cucumber, an apple – so my appearance
should be associated with goodies. Comb
began practice crowing. He sounded like
a teenaged boy coming into his adult voice. He now sounds like a rooster soundtrack.

Back when my children were little we lived in a very nice
neighborhood which abutted some nice older homes. Our neighborhood was governed by a
Restrictive Covenant which meant, among other things, I could not have poultry,
but our neighbor on the other street had chickens, geese and other assorted
animals, including a rooster who crowed all day. Some of our neighbors were unhappy that these
creatures were allowed, even outside our neighborhood, but a random experience
allowed me to expose my children to the life I’d known before Foxborough. One rainy Saturday morning I noticed what
appeared to be a White hen roosting in my next door neighbor’s cellar
window. I knew very well that these
folks did not have poultry so I called over to ask if they knew anything about
this bird. They did not. After several more calls I found this poor
little hen belonged to our neighbor on the next street. She came over, claimed her hen with my two
youngest children there, and invited us to come over to meet her animals. Oh boy, did we go!! Mrs. White was more than happy to share her
knowledge of the birds and even sent us home with huge goose eggs. She had family to tend to out of the area and
invited my children to mind her chickens and geese when she was away. The girls loved taking care of them and
collecting eggs and took quite a shine to the chickens. Ginny and Vicky would visit Mrs. White on a
regular basis and I thank her in my heart for being such a positive influence
on them.

It wasn’t all sweetness and light, however, and one night a
weasel got into the coop. They have a
distinctive way of killing their prey – evisceration. My girls were not so young and tender as to
be unable to understand this. Mrs. White
waited a good, long while before getting any more chickens but my girls had
learned lessons that few of their peers had.
I owe Mrs. White for befriending my daughters and teaching them things I
could not. It does take a village to
raise a child.