These Beautiful Days: The day I resuscitated a Chicken..... And other poultry tales!

There was moment in time when I realised that my life was different. It was the moment my husband and brother walked in and found me giving mouth to mouth to a chicken.... ewww I can’t believe it either but let me give you the back story of how this came to be.

When we told the kids we were moving we knew the house we were moving to had chickens and a coop. So every time the kids would say that they didn’t want to move because they would miss their friends, activities, home school, pre-school, family we would say “It’s okay we will get some chickens”. It became our mantra of sorts. When we arrived there were 3 chickens in the coop for 24 hours before they had to go with the previous occupants of the house. But that was okay because “we will get some chickens”. It turns out it was the wrong time of year for hatching baby chicks but one of the women in town said that she would give us some of her chickens. I soon discovered that in the country these things don’t happen quickly (it’s the Country Way) and a few months went past. One morning we got a call “Do ya want some chickens?” “Sure we’ll be there soon”. Later that day we had 6 chickens, Harriet, Ronette, Ginny, Marnie, Chest and Courtney all tucked up in the backyard coop.

Months went past and all was well. Then Ginny got a sore eye we nursed her back to health inside the house, frequently finding her on the lounge watching TV with the kids in the process. This is when I got over my fear of chickens as I bathed her eye with saline 3 times a day, until she made a full recovery and was reunited with her plucky friends.

One morning when all was well in the land of the chickens we heard what best can be descibed as a “Errrccc a doddle doo” sound from the coop. Umm, Ginny was actually Ginny Boy. We also held a suspicion about Marnie’s behaviour with jumping on the back of the other chickens. What to do now? These two were the two favourites and the friendliest of the lot now here they were the dreaded “R” word... Roosters! We knew we couldn’t keep them both and we couldn’t decide who to give away, so we had an idea. We would try and breed them, get some baby chicks and then pass the Roosters over the when the chicks arrived. We had a clucky chicken and we waited... and waited and waited finally a chick hatched, the much loved Maharnie and she lived about 12 hours before she died. We were all so sad. Another two chicks tried to hatch then also died, talk about giving these city kids a crash course in life in the country.

The kids saying goodbye to Maharnie

A day or so later the Roosters took to it, we had been told that they would fight but I had no idea they would be so crazy. They danced around each other as if in a trance and tried their best to harm each other. I tried the hose, a stick, and loud noises and eventually split them up by chasing them around the yard and caught one. I put this one in the shed, locked the other one up and went to the town touch football game, intending to offload two Roosters as soon as possible. The next day the girls bravely cuddled their beloved roosters before they were collected in a feed bag. Marnie Boy and Ginny Boy are now seeing out their days out on a farm outside of town.

After all this we were a little chickened out when the kids started asking about some baby chicks “its okay we’ll get some chickens from the shop”. I arrived back from a trip to town with a light, a box, newspaper and 4 day old hens, Luna, Coco, Ginny and Hermione. These tiny baby chicks were fed, cuddled and cleaned twice a day, they sat on our laps and fell asleep on the lounge with the kids at night.

Much Loved

Two days later the kids had been playing with them when I heard a cry and scream from where the chickens were. Luna, Master 2’s chicken was dead. The kids were beside themselves and I was alone, I thought I have to try something.... so I tried mouth to beak, tiny little breaths into the little beak and that’s how my husband and visiting brother found me a few moments later. They didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, I know it’s a sight that they won’t forget and you can laugh about it because it worked. Lucky Luna as she is now known started to come around and rested with a hot water bottle for a few moments until she was reunited with her little friends.

Luna recovering sleeping after her big ordeal with her owner

Today we have 8 lovely ladies in the chicken coop, who are patient enough to let the kids play with them, and even dress them up. The chickens eat all our scraps and produce 4 of the most beautiful eggs each day. They bring so much joy to our lives and each has their own personality and funny little ways. They really are lovely pets and very much a part of our family and contribute so much to “these beautiful days”.