THE CHICKEN DIARIES - JULY

Bad Boris met his nemesis this month. A very sad day, but he was the author of his own demise. I wrote in June that he was attacking Richard (even when he was driving the tractor) and harassing the young female hens. Well, things went from bad to worse. We started finding very young chickens dead or dying; Richard could not set foot in the garden without Boris creeping up on him (while mentally sharpening his spurs – Boris that is - not Richard) and his aggressive influence was generally making everyone very unhappy.

Finally Richard decided that things could continue no longer. All I was aware of was a lot of shouting and squawking, which continued to be heard – intermittently – for about half an hour as Richard pursued Boris around the garden. And Boris attacked back. It was a hot day and I wasn’t sure whether my spouse was going to be a casualty of the heat or whether Boris would finally meet his match. I plotted their course from the hen houses to the orchard, to the vegetable garden to the flower beds, down to the pond and up again towards the meadow. Everyone else in the garden – hens, cat, dog, me, kept a very low profile. It was clearly a fight to the death.  I am happy to say Richard won. He returned to the house visibly shaken, dripping with sweat, but victorious. What happened to Boris’s body I will never know. We didn’t eat him; once you name them eating them becomes a real no-no in the Adams household.

From that point the chicken community became much more balanced. His remaining two wives immediately went broody and took to the hen house together to share the period of egg incubation. Between them they were sitting on seven eggs. His children – we were left with eight young Lavender Pekins (six hens and two young cockerels) – became much more relaxed around the garden. Eventually the two mothers between them hatched three chicks and together they all left the nesting area and took their babies into the garden. Which one had done the hatching and which one was stealing the credit will always be a mystery to us, and probably to them as well because they are sharing all the glory and all the work.

However, because they left the nest when they did four eggs remained unhatched and, because the weather has been so warm, one remaining egg pipped – and out popped chick number four. What to do now? We decided to lend a hand and took the chick into the garden to be re-united with the two mothers and three other chicks. This should have been a happy ending, but no; they started to attack it. We tried again. That night we put the two mothers, their three acknowleged infants and the ‘orphan’ into an ark where they would be penned in and could rear their young free from the risk of predator attack.

We thought that by spending the night under one of the mothers the chick would adopt their smell and become part of the clutch. Hen have excellent eyesight and so can spot an introduced chick if it looks at all different to their own. It is quite normal for them to attack outsiders, but this chick, being another Lavender Pekin, was identical to the other three. We were confident things would work out for the little fellow.

Next morning we found its body. Another lesson learned. July has been a cruel month in the poulallier.