Friday 5 April 2019

No chicken.

As well as peace, calm and quiet, living in the country offers moments of hilarity. Such was the case when our dear neighbours went away this week, leaving Richard In Charge Of Chickens. Or, more accurately, In Charge Of Putting Chickens To Bed. (And getting them up again in the morning.)

Sounded easy. Go round just before dusk, encourage the hens into their houses, shut the door and Avoid The Cockerel.

The cockerel, apparently, had a penchant for attack legs.

My husband is a farm boy. Chickens and roosters hold no fear for him. No problem.

So, the first day, as he put his fluorescent yellow cycling jacket on (garment of choice for every outdoor activity), I said: "You need to take the broom with you. Remember, Nicky warned you that you needed a broom or a rake to fend off the cockerel?"
"Oh, I won't need that," was the insouciant reply.

There was a little more conversation after that, as I reminded him that Nicky had warned about the cockerel Several Times, but he still went off unarmed. Oh well.

He was away a surprisingly long time. This is how it went:

Two hens were already in their house, so he shut it up and started to encourage the others to go in to the other house. Oh no. No way were they going in there, so he had to open up the first house again whereupon the other hens scuttled out of it.

It took quite some time to get them all inside. So absorbing was this task, that Richard forgot about the rooster, until a sudden stabbing pain in his shin caused him to leap a couple of feet in the air. The rooster had rushed out from behind the chicken house and grasped his leg with its vicious, razor-sharp, spur claws.

Here, let us remind ourselves that Richard is tall and incredibly lean, resembling a human daddy-long-legs. As he leapt about, shaking the rooster off, the bird instantly trying to attack once more, he managed to take off his jacket, using it as a defensive barrier between him and the bird. The jacket's virulent yellow, fortunately, seemed to deter it and he managed to avoid both further attack AND to get the cockerel safely inside with the rest of the chickens.

The whole performance - Richard capering around the hen houses in the middle of our neighbour's field - was duly watched and admired by our friends whose house overlooks. They refrained from videoing the proceedings - sadly. But the telling of the story becomes more hilarious every time ....

Not quite Death By Chicken.