Some People are more Generous than Others.

It could be said that Buck is getting his own back or that he knows how to nurse a grievance.
"You never know" [ he remarked to me this morning ]"how a day is going to turn out.
It starts with a broom and a bag and a car ride that you are pretty sure will end up turning you into soup, jewelry and compost, but what happens is you land in a yard managed by a no-nothing whose generosity and ignorance may be successfully exploited for your benefit.
This sort of attitude may be why you wound up with your legs tied together, head down in a bag in the first place, but this is a whole new ball game and it can't hurt to try the traditional approach first."
" Hens!"  he said to himself "This is looking good."
Well.  Maybe not so good, Buck, because Bette had established herself as the alpha hen, and was just getting around to learning to crow when this testosterone ridden giant turned up and thought that he had the roost under his control by divine fiat.  Her solution?  She chewed of the end of one of his toes.  Just a stub now, no toenail at all.  You wouldn't think a roosters feet could get any uglier, but they can.  Today I put out a nice fresh bowl of warm water for them and Buck immediately stepped in it rinsing off his feet, but decreasing any inspiration the other Avian Americans might have had to dip their beaks.
Buck occasionally stands thoughtfully with his amputated toe tucked up into his belly, more in this season - [ I wonder if the stump helps him predict the weather?] and broods on past wrongs and possible difficult futures;  affronts, slights and unwarranted interference is on his mind.  You can see it in his eyes.  These are the times when it is prudent to steer clear.
I put out a pile of peanut nibs for them this morning, and heard the usual excited noises.
Buck stood dead center on the pile of food so that any ladies who wanted it would have to  muscle in to get it.  This did not bother him, it was an opportunity for him to molest hens in a tight space.  Not enough distance for all of them to get far enough away.  Good probability for him of getting lucky.  Whatever it takes to dull the edge of memory,Buck.  

and about that accordion....

On one of the more acceptable chicken blogs, written by someone who presents as knowing what they are talking about and answering questions, the question was posed "Can chickens like music?".  That's the silliest question I've heard all week and it's up against some stiff competition in this time of politicians being underfoot.
Of course chickens like music.
Cats are another story.  I only need to open an accordion or guitar case and I hear the flap of the cat door, but the chickens run from wherever they are in the yard and stand around next to the house swaying and paying very close attention.
They don't howl like a dog, they just murmur amongst themselves, and when I am done practicing or playing, they wander off, spread out and look for the next bit of available entertainment.  They are the best possible audience, but it doesn't stop there.  I posted in the past about Buck liking the sound of his own voice, leaning in to the piano harp to hear his crowing echo back to him, but I have caught him also standing near other metal objects and crowing, pausing to listen and repeating.  I have a cast off high hat in the yard that I have standing on edge behind a statue of Buddha that he has found interesting.  He tries pecking it to get it to ring also.  Chickens and music?  Absolutely.  Now if I could just get the hens to dance in lines......

Freezer Burn

Been awhile since Buck has had anything to say to me.  We had one hell of a couple of weeks where it was frequently too cold for the chickens to be willing to come out of the coop.  On the sunnier less windy days, one or two of the more rebellious girls would come down the ramp and go under the coop and hunker down in the frozen dirt and complain.  The coop got pretty nasty over a few days, but they had thawed out water and heat until somebody's eye caught the glowing red light of the ceramic heater bolted to the wall and turned it off.
The result was that Buck got frostbite on his comb, and one of the girls has a cough that would do any smoker proud.

When we finally had a warmish day, even though it was raining, they braved the slippery surfaces to crowd on to the porch and beg for some kind of more interesting food than they had been eating.
I found that they really enjoy iceberg lettuce.  Why?  Maybe it's because it has good water content and stays put on the ball, so that it's kind of like a popsicle.
I get quite a bit of Romaine that has been deemed unworthy for sale by the local rich person's emporium, so I give them some of that and they play catch with it.  They eventually eat it too, but not before they have spread it around, trampled it and gotten it wedged in places you would not believe.
Buck has been significantly slowed down by the cold, yesterday, he was milling around my feet with the girls hoping I'd move a little faster to give him something to do, but in spite of what he thinks of me, I can learn, so I stay pretty still around him.   I was able to reach down and touch his back before getting a look of total indignation and affront.  Today, I was trying to clean off yesterdays mess of partially chewed romaine and trampled kale from the porch. He paused to tell me what he thought of me [I don't think what he said was meant as a compliment] instead of the usual jihad on the broom.  He gave the straw end one desultory peck before side stepping away.  Definitely off his game.
I'm trying to catch the hen with the cough, I have heard that what you do with a coughing hen is to kill her, but I don't think I have the willingness to do that.  I'd rather put her in a warm safe place, isolated from the others until it stops.

This picture doesn't show how completely soaked and bedraggled she got from the rain, but her gaze gives you an idea of what she thought of it.
I'm with them.  I'm glad of a mildish Winter, and white clawing it until Spring.  It's good to hear them outside on the days when the temperature is in the 40's talking to one another.  It's good to hear them discuss the pleasures of life and expressing the delight in finding some charming thing to eat, grapes, blueberries, and, I have found, peanuts.  They don't necessarily trust me to get very close to them, but it's just that they know they are irresistible, and if allowed, people will take liberties.
I remind myself that nobody is allowed to ask the Queen a direct question.  It's sort of that kind of relationship.

An Uphill Winter.

This morning, I unaccountably woke up early enough to let the chickens out at a time of their choosing.  I like to sleep in until 8.  Buck starts making noise before it is anything like sunrise.  He's like those people who, when they invite you to dinner, tell you it's an hour earlier than it really is because they know you well enough to know better.
I've gotten pretty good at getting out of the way in spite of morning stiffness or lethargy.  Today I got all the way back to the house and had a cup of coffee made before Buck and most of the girls would put their un-shod feet in the snow.
Stella and Pearl came running out and raced ahead of me to the porch where they got first pick of the scraps of lettuce and other vegetables.
I put out some fresh unbroken leaves of collards, chard and romaine for them and they danced back and forth, tossing the lettuce in to the air, playing catch with it and finally eating it.
At about 9, when it had warmed up a bit, everyone was on the porch playing volley ball with the lettuce.  I was trying to determine what the rules were but all I could discern was that the Bridge Club still believe that they go first when treats are distributed, and snap a beak at the B's until they have had enough to be willing to share.  The B group jump up in the air and squeak in protest.
Barbie is a flier, and has found that she can exploit the established ladies' fear of things coming from above by climbing up on the wood pile and flapping in to their midst.
It buys her some time.
Buck is displaying what looks like frostbite on his comb, even though the coop is heated.  I do not understand.  I went online to a specialist in avian issues, but they were not helpful.  I don't know why I keep asking, nobody seems to know anything.
Well;  I guess I have to let myself off the hook, because nobody else is going to.  Buck is in a warm place, how is he getting frostbite?  None of the girls have it, because they sleep with heads protected.
I suppose Buck has to be on guard duty and can't take a moment to see that his head stays warm.
Maybe a little hat?

New Year?

Buck could give a rat's hinder about a new year.  He doesn't even know that 6 months ago his future looked more like a barbecue than an acre and 7 pretty girls.  Some of them virgins, he might have thought he had died and gone to a 10% Muslim paradise.
[I'd better watch it, suggesting that chickens are followers of Mohammed could get the red van blown up,  or worse....]
Chickens don't have the need to think about the future, if they did, they would organize.

Not that they aren't organized, it's just not political.
Chickens don't have the perspective of a long view.
They have no plan.
I'm not criticizing fowl company, having a plan hasn't worked out all that well for us hominids.  Chickens may have learned from the fate of their oviraptor ancestors that laying eggs is one thing - finding them in the nest at the end of the day is another.
So, for this New Year, I'm taking a page from the Book of Buck.
Don't count your chickens before they are hatched.