Ex- Bat Hen Update...

Sora and Bridgette are doing well out with the flock. The first day was full of much posturing and chest bumping with the established hens, and some downright neck grabbing by the top hens, who felt they needed to REALLY drive their point home. We intervened, gently...pushing them apart and petting and praising them for NOT fighting. This seemed to work for the most part and today all was peaceful.

But poor Sora and Bridgette have NO idea how to roost on perches, and need to be placed there in the evening. They HAVE learned where the coop (and the food) is, so they can get in and out of it with ease. Today was sun and dust bath heaven. No eggs from either one yet, though they have peeked in the nest boxes.

Bridgette is growing new feathers at great speed, and is getting more talkative. Today she saw a cat on the fence and threw a cackling fit that several other hens took up. Sora is much more quiet and laid back, a true California girl. Both girls are very attached to each other and stick together constantly. They have learned that when we appear it means good things like food & pets, so they come running. Sora loves to be picked up and petted, but Bridgette not so much--she'll come running up to us, but due to her prickly state is NOT all that hot on being touched. We expected this, so we'll just give her time to get those new feathers out. She'll be a beauty once she does!

So My Kid Has A Cause...

...and it's to rescue ex-battery hens.

This all happened quite suddenly the other day, when I came across a funny YouTube video to share with her about a rooster. She loves stuff like this, so we looked at a few others as well.

This one, 'A Battery Hen's Hope' is what got to all of us--it's heartbreaking and touching all at the same time, and represents just one bird out of thousands:

After N. saw it, and I had to explain to her the concept of battery cages in egg farms and how and why animals are housed that way, she was OUTRAGED, and rightly so.

Having to explain the worst parts of society and humankind as a whole is one of the worst things you will ever have to do as a parent, by the way. Forget about the 'birds & bees' talk. Watching her faith in humanity and 'doing the right thing' die in your childs' eyes as you explain corporate cruelty is heartrending. The fact that this type of 'animals are disposable' thinking is commonplace and accepted is even harder.

So OK, the kid now wants to stage a rescue and save ALL of the battery hens on Earth. I explain to her that unfortunately this just isn't possible, but people DO try...then she realizes that she has seen ex-battery hens at the feed store!

C'mon mom, off to the feed store! Never mind that it's 8:30 at night and the feed store is closed.

Well, we have to go to the feed store the next day anyway to get chicken feed, so I agree to look at the ex-battery hens then.

Ha. 'Look'. Right...

So here they are, our two adoptees:

Bridgette, a sweet, curious, talkative Red Star who has suffered the loss of most of her feathers and has been de-beaked:

and Sora, a camera-shy White Leghorn who has been at the feed store long enough to grow some of her feathers back:

Neither of them had ANY idea what table scraps were, but are quite docile and quiet. Bridgette has quite a bit of trouble eating with part of her beak gone, but I'm hoping it'll grow back eventually. Both of them spent last night and today in the house, we're medicating and worming them right away since I'm pretty sure that egg farms don't care a whole lot about keeping individual birds healthy long-term.

Goodbye, Mrs. Black

Mrs. Black died today.

Peacefully, it seems, and of natural causes. But still a shock for her to turn up missing at nightfall when it was time to close up the coop and say goodnight to our little backyard flock of pet chickens.

A quick search of the garage, where a few months back she had managed to hide and gave us a scare, produced nothing. We found her curled up underneath my daughter's backyard climbing-castle-thing; one of those plastic, brightly colored things that kids love these days. Mrs. Black had no marks on her and seems to have slipped her earthly bounds quickly and quietly with no fuss.

Mrs. Black was a Chicken Hell feed store rescue and had health problems from the start, along with having almost no feathers on her skinny little body. One eye was swollen shut and weeping fluid and she wheezed something awful. Seeing her in that horrible place I hadn't expected her to last long, but couldn't stand to walk away and leave her there. We bought her and brought her home after a trip to the vet for medication. She spent two months inside the house getting well, fattening up and growing feathers. Her eye, which I had doubted was even still there, healed up and turned out fine. She got her name from my then 2 year old daughter, who walked by her one day and said, "Oh...hello Mrs. Black!" Mrs. Black had a quiet dignity and could stand next to you for several minutes before you realized she was there.

We will miss her sweet nature, wall-eyed stare and her raspy-voiced burblings. Just this afternoon she had come running with the rest when I passed out a handful of strawberries and all was right with the world. Just yesterday I stopped on the back porch to give her a quick pet.

I know some people will read this and think, "It was just a chicken!" What most people don't know is how personable, smart and cheerful chickens are and what terrific pets they make.

Tomorrow we will bury her in a bed of cut flowers, under the bay tree by the back fence.

Goodbye Mrs. B.