NOW THAT'S A ROO OF A DIFFERENT COLOR

And That's How He Earned His New Name: Houdini

  

WE'VE BEEN LUCKY WITH RAIN IN BIRDLAND. The whole yard is green and the cucurbit that sprouted volunteer where the old chicken coop was, has become a lush patch with leaves the size of platters and big, trumpeting orange flowers. It is vining out into the yard and green bulbous egg-sized fruits have set on. Maybe it's pumpkin, maybe squash. I can't wait to see. I did plant a pumpkin patch for my sister where the old compost pile was before we spread it out in the vegetable and flowerbeds. I planted both pie pumpkins and big ones for Jack-o-Lanterns. My sister wants to have a harvest festival in October, and we have to plan ahead. These seedlings are just emerging from their hills.

The Whole Yard Is Green

Last week I got an email from Mary in Bement who offered me a rooster. Now, as much as I love chickens, I have turned down many generous offers of roosters. A nicely balanced flock has one rooster for every dozen or so hens. Too many roosters will fight with each other and exhaust the hens. We already had 2, and everyone was getting along, but this one was a Lavender Orpington. If you have never seen one, you should look it up. They are grey with a rosy tint. Orpingtons are gentle by nature, and these are just lovely. I agreed to try to integrate Mary's rooster into my flock. We put him in a cage after she brought him over, just for the day. We would wait until after dark to introduce him to the coop. Sometimes chickens will accept a new member in the dark, and by morning forget that they were ever strangers. Well, the first thing that happened is that he got out of the cage. Ellis walked out to the car and saw the rooster in the crate by the garage. My youngest was going out on the town. He started driving away, but saw the empty cage in his rear-view mirror. He parked and came to tell me, and we were able to catch the rooster and put him back. After the flock returned to the coop for the night I snuck the new rooster into the coop. In the morning, I let everybody out but him, hoping a day in the coop would teach him that this is his new home, or at least that this is where he can find food and water. But by chicken-dark, he was gone again. Again we didn't know how he escaped. That's how he earned his new name: Houdini.

Integrating him into the flock didn't go well. With chickens you are always going to have pecking order issues. Mean Mr. Mustard, our old, one-eyed rooster is the big cheese, and he took issue with his new coop-mate, chasing him away when Houdini went near a hen. Houdini lost most of his tail feathers in the scuffle. To make matters worse, Ursula chased him, too. My dog learned long ago not to chase chickens, but who was this new bird of a different color and smell? Whenever Ursula saw Houdini, she would tear after him. The poor guy took to hiding under the cedar tree. My best efforts to stop the terror were fruitless. Finally I decided that Ursula wouldn't go outside unless she was on a leash. I thought I could train her to leave Houdini alone if I could immediately correct her. The problem was, Houdini was already so terrorized that he would head for the hills every time he saw Ursula coming, so we could never get close enough for me to correct the chasing behavior.

The Chicken Didn't Know This

That day Michael came home with a new idea. At work my husband had lamented about the chicken chasing behavior to a friend who had a solution. It was simple, but so silly, I didn't see how it could work. His friend had said, "Let Ursula smell the chicken's butt." The idea was that Ursula was just trying to check out this new member of the Birdland community by sniffing his butt. The chicken didn't know that, and would run away, thus a chase would ensue, and the problem just kept getting worse.

Sniff in Beauty: Foster Peace: Blessed Be.

I went out and easily caught Houdini. Michael was waiting inside with Ursula. It took about 3 seconds. I offered Houdini to the dog, butt out. Ursula sniffed. She sniffed again, and then walked away. I put Houdini down on the floor. He walked around cautiously. Ursula went into the other room to look for her ball. The crisis was over. It was anticlimactic. Now Ursula can go back to stealing sandwiches, and Houdini can go back to asserting himself into the flock.

CHICKEN DARK

CAN ANYTHING BE MORE SATISFYING than getting the last chicken into the coop as the sun is going down? About half of our chickens prefer to roost high in the apple tree, so we have to encourage them in all sorts of ways to come into the safety of the aviary. One big encouragment is, of course, food. I feed them some in the morning, then let them out to scratch in the yard and they snap up all sorts of snacks—bugs; greens of Dandelion, Clover, Queen Anne's Lace; Apples; the meats of Walnuts that have been cracked by squirrels or by being backed over by the car. In fact, the flock spends the bulk of their days quietly grazing, tails up, beaks to the ground, making satisfied clucking sounds. Still, when they see me walking toward the aviary with a big, galvanized metal scoop, they'll come running. And if you haven't seen a chicken run toward you, you should come out at feeding time.

Sammy Runs

“Chicken Dark” is what we call the time of day when the sun is about to set and the chickens head back to their coop while they can still see. Chickens really do go home to roost,  but we sometimes have a difference of opinion about where “home” is. In the mornings, after Ursula has had her run, I prop open the aviary door and let the chickens out for the day. For now we can either have free-range chickens or a free-range dog. Maybe someday we'll have both, and one of these days I'll tell you about our journey toward a peaceable kingdom at Birdland. The birds have their day in the yard, while Ursula watches from the window. With careful supervision (preferably by at least two of us) she can play fetch. She is increasing her vocabulary and learning the fine distinctions between “frisbee” and “chicken.” She is also learning impulse control, and we can see it in her eyes when she is about to bolt, and take off to the chicken side of the yard. Most of the time we can redirect her, but occasionally, chaos ensues, and we run for the garden hose as a defense of chicken territory.

The flock spends the bulk of their days quietly grazing, tails up, beaks to the ground,
making satisfied clucking sounds. 

In the evenings, if I can get home before chicken dark, I carry another scoop of food, and most of the flock will follow me into the pen. A few stragglers will circle around the aviary, and this is where an extra person can help. One person can hold open the door, while the other herds the flock clockwise around the aviary. With each circle, a few more slip through the door to safety for the night. The old, red rooster gets curious and tries to come out, and that is where a rake is convenient. It's a trick to block his exit while encouraging the stragglers to come in.

If we wait too long, half a dozen of the hens will be perched in the apple tree. A few will hop down when they see me coming with the scoop, but 3 or 4 will hop up a little higher into the tree. In summer, the leaves provide a little shelter from the weather, and hide them from predators. But now the leaves are falling. We have a variety of chickens, and though a sharp-eyed owl would probably see the moonlight glinting off of the beak of one of the brown hens, we have two white ones who like to roost in the tree. Even to my failing, human eyesight they look like bright neon signs that say “Free Lunch” to any nighttime predator. The flock has thinned since they began this habit, so I do my best to discourage it. Sometimes the ruckus below gets them curious enough that they will fly down and get caught up in the frenzy of snack time, but sometimes they pretend not to notice. That's when the garden hose comes in handy.

Roost in Beauty; Shelter Peace; Blessed Be.