Four and a Half Hens

How many do you have?  That's nearly alway the first question after most folks hear I have chickens. The answer is usually, "Five."  But the last month or so, the truth is, "Four and a half."

Petty coat showing on a tiny hen

We'd been away for ten days or so building a car port in Bend for our daughter.  Kind neighbors came twice a day to tend the five hens.  During that time a common but very strange-looking thing happened to my plumpest, most vigorous chicken.   Massive handfuls of feathers appeared in the coop.  Every morning they flowed out of the roost area.  Her caretaker was alarmed and removed the feathers.  She was nearly afraid to look for fear she would find a dead hen, naked and cold.

Grunge comes and goes in the fashion world,
but this style is never in.

Kate Perry Chicken, the most fashion conscious girl of the flock, was getting smaller and smaller.  By the time we came home, she was only half the size of the other hens and about a third of her own usual self.

But Nature is balanced, and all is well.  Kate is close to three quarters of herself again.  Soon her comb will be redder, her tail feathers tall, and plump will be her shape.  Things I get to do today will include counting my hens is whole, round numbers.

She's a Hottie Now!

Second day of the rest of her life

She was a Shrinking Violet a month ago.  Now really one of the flock, though still at the bottom according to Lena Horn Hen and Nina Simone Chicken, she blends in and moves with the rest of the girls rather easily .

A week later

But something is very different about Violet from when she first arrived.  Things I get to do today will be to check her out . My memory serves me better than the photos can show since hens are always on the move and therefore usually out of focus in their portraits.  This I recall well.  Violet's comb was medium pink when she arrived.  It was not particularly large either.

Still pinkish in the comb

This afternoon during one of those many times each day when I find myself just hanging out with the girls to enjoy their company and listen to them quietly pass hen-pen gossip, it became quite clear.  Violet's been dipping into the makeup or she's a natural-born beauty slow to bloom.

Big and Red!  Wouldn't red toenails be drop-dead gorgeous on her?

She's a hot one!

Dresses, a Bit Ragged and Torn

Holes and tatters in Nora Jones' garment.

They've lasted a year of 24/7 wear.  New ones are on the way.  My girls hope to look swell again for the holidays (probably not by Thanksgiving), and their new dresses will be the perfect thing.

Katy Perry Chicken looking far worse than last year's
Bad Hair months. 

Pin feathers will give way in a shower of milky dust to lush, strong feathers that will keep the girls warm for the winter season.




Today's rain has kept the hens in the shelter of the coop nearly all day. They're grateful to be loved, chicken pets instead of commercial turkeys.

And though one of the Things I get to do today is lay one of the hens to rest layered in straw and under the damp earth, I'm glad they are my pets as well. And Queen Latifah Hen, though now gone, no longer has to deal with faulty kidneys. All is well on the city farm.

From Bad to Worse

I'm starting to feel sorry for the rich and famous.  Having all of ones worst moments investigated and published, and even more horrible, having the most difficult and private times documented with glossy photographs for the whole world to see has to be the pits.  (I'm even considering feeling sorry for you, Kim.)

Famous chicken-person, Miss Katy Perry Chicken, thinks one of the Things I get to do today is making life miserable for her.  As you all know from the recent post "Chicken Hair," hens have long-term unglamorous periods called molting.  It was photo documented that she had lost a whole chunk of her "hair" just above her neck in the back.  And today I (the paparazzi) am following her around the hen pen, popping out from behind plants and structures to catch a gosh-awful shot of her latest disaster hair-do.  With only pin feathers covering her whole head and neck and closely resembling a turkey vulture, she is definitely sporting the latest hair-don't.

Katy turning away from the camera  to escape the glare of publicity,
her scrappy-looking head and neck clearly visible.

Ducking behind the crowd of other better-and-more-sleekly-coifed girls

"Sparse" they called it in The Times.

The Observer noted it was "prickly."

"No comment" pled The Herald.

The Oregonian: "We've seen better do's.  Look's like she's seen better days."

But for the fashion conscious, like Katy's we know, this one included, there is hope.
Right in the middle of the back of her head are two or three feathers that have
sprung loose from their tight, pin structure.  A week from now her head will
be covered with brand-new, luxurious feathers.  Forget Paris, London or New York.
This is the latest look.