Chicken Drama

I’m fortunate to have a somewhat uneventful life currently. No births, deaths, moving, divorce, job losses, or family drama. See, I’ve got nothing and it’s harder to blog when things are pretty boring all of the time. This is the reason I live vicariously through my chickens. My chickens have it all-new chicks, sex with multiple partners, hawks trying to kill them, a rooster who loves one son and hates another, and brothers fighting to the death. And all of this happened today.

Carlos our oldest and most aggressive rooster is the proud father of two sons and a daughter. The relationship he has with his children is, well, weird. For instance, this evening he watched his son copulate with his daughter before he decided he wanted a piece of the action. It all makes me want to vomit. I guess chickens don’t quite see family relationships the way we do.

This post is actually about the complex relationship between Carlos and his sons Eddie and Clumsia. Carlos and Clumsia get along well and work together taking care of the hens. They also would both like to see Eddie dead. Eddie is a goofy, gentle rooster, the kind of rooster I like. Eddie has been sequestered away from the rest of the flock since we noticed his foot was injured. We have five new chicks almost ready to join the group, so we decided we would let Eddie take care of them. Glenn let all of the chickens out today in order to set up two separate hen houses. I noticed Oliver transfixed on something he was watching outside as I tried to get him to eat yogurt. I asked him what he was looking at and he said, “They are attacking!”

Poor Eddie was being beaten down by Clumsia. You can see the damage done to Eddie’s comb and wattle. Eddie now has a nice wing of the hen house and his chicks moved in this afternoon. We hope our outcast rooster finds a little bit of happiness with his own group.

This is a picture of Eddie's new family a few weeks ago. Honey, Bea, Last and Georgie are in the picture.