Are You Chicken?

It amuses me that people are interested in the chickens. The chickens amuse me, too. I often watched them half-fly or run across the yard, and ponder their dinosaur-like ways. William claims that he'll never again name another chicken "Chicken Lickin'" for it appears to be bad luck (they've all been eaten by varmits). Yet, we still persist in giving them some names, as when they are pets more than livestock, and you see them daily, well, you go a bit batty and start worrying about them, talking to them, and setting everyone in your community thinking you are eccentric. Ladybird World Mother was interested in our chicken names, so I will share a few characters with you.


This is "Cana", so named after her breed "Ameraucana". Cana is the boss hen. Given the lack of a rooster which can appropriately point out morsels that those beneath him might have overlooked, Cana has stepped into this role, clucking like a mother hen would to chicks for the bigger hens to eat this particular food bite. The bigger hens do not seem to mind being told how and when to eat.


This is "Buffy", so named because she is a Buff Orpington and because well, let's just say she's a few bricks short of a load. Buffy is a survivor, though, once mauled by a dog which left her with a four inch gash to the bone. A bit of daily lidocaine spray healed her. She's never the one the racoon snatches. As a result, she is one of our oldest hens, perhaps six years old. And no, she doesn't lay anymore. She's "retired".

The chicken to the left is the hen that morphed into a rooster. Honestly, he looked like a hen for a long time. Until he crowed. (There are documented cases of developing hens becoming roosters in flocks that lacked one. Did this happen or was he a late bloomer?) Because he says hello to the morning and because I was reading Cloudia's book about Hawaii, I wanted to name him "Aloha", picturing each morning that his crow says "A-LOOOOW-ha!" Please, however, do not discuss this with William who is adamant that his name be "Mo", though we've already had a Mo or two. He was insistent to the point of fisticuffs.

The bantam hen to his right is unnamed. She is his foster mother, or perhaps more accurately, surrogate mother, for she hatched him from an egg produced by Cana and the late Lester the Molester Jr. Therefore, Aloha is 3/4 Ameraucana. The surrogate hen is 1/2 blue silkie, daughter of the late Chickin' Lickin'.

So, there you have it, a few of our "personalities".

Notes:

We are expecting a "winter storm". This generally causes a run on the milk and bread at StuffMart and a great deal of expectation. William got his sled out for a test run today on our light ground covering, but is hoping for real snow tomorrow.