The stray chicken is back. Actually, she’s been pecking around the house ever since the lately departed Osa tried to eat her. I don’t see her every day, but she’s here. Often, the first sound I hear in the morning is her whoak, whoak, whoak, outside the bedroom window. I usually wake up because I want to call back: whoak, whoak, whoak yourself.
One day this week, Jack came in from working in the garden. I said, “I want to start feeding the chicken.” I’d thrown out some really sour, old, sourdough bread, and she’d eaten it, but I wanted to go to the Co-op Pursical, and buy some honest-to-god chicken feed.
Jack said, “But do you want the chicken to feed you?” and held out three precious little eggs.
“Oh my god,” I said, “Now we really do have to name her.” But what? Chicken Little, or Henny Penny? Hens are old, I think. Do they lay eggs? Yes, hens are chickens that lay eggs. Who knew? So we can call her Henny Penny or Chicken Little. I like Henny Penny.
Off I went, into the internet world of chickens. Who knew how complicated chickens could be? In 2003, there were 24 billion chickens in the world. I try to envision that many chickens. I wonder how many times 24 billion chickens holding hands- er- feet, would go around the world. Would they straddle it, or more? And their song- we are the chickens of the world- how would that go?
Chicken Little/ Henny Penny
A search of the internet revealed that chickens eat grass and bugs. We’ve got plenty of them, and worms too. I saw worms-a-plenty when I pulled the spent basil plants from my herb garden. Chickens also eat mice and other critters, dead or alive. Cool. Noir, our evil she-cat, finds rats and mice galore, not to mention geckos, lizards and toads.
My research led me into some stupid questions we’ve all spent too much time thinking about. For example: which came first, the chicken or the egg? Hurray. I know the answer to that question. I read it recently: the chicken came first.
Exploring the world of chickens, I found a list of the top 10 reasons to keep chickens. Really. They make good pets, it seems. They’re smart. Move over, Buddha, Hobbes and Noir. Especially, Noir.
A little re-write: Chicken Little was in the yard one day, and a guyaba fruit fell on her head. She ran around the house, and ran right by Osa, who broke her chain, and gave chase. Oh no! Chicken little/Henny Penny thought. Swawk, swawk! Luckily, she escaped Osa. Hm, she thought. Lots of grass and bugs around here. Think I’ll stay!
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