Chicken boots and the spectacles thief

Most of the hens on the farm are of an Indian game type and are mainly bred as table birds. They are not the best egg layers.

There are large sections of the year where they don't produce eggs and then at the start of spring and summer the eggs are in abundance.

So I decided that I would start on a breeding program that would yield chooks that would lay eggs over most of the year, yet still retain most of the qualities that make excellent eating birds.

I obtained a couple of roosters that were mainly Isa Brown types, and one pure breed Isa Brown. The two older roosters were ready to breed this season so I set two hens, this yielded 16 chickens.

The chickens are the quietest birds I have ever seen, walking around the yard has been reduced to a shuffle since the chicks are always under foot.

I have even had to retrieve them out of gumboots, which would not be much of a problem except that I was wearing these boots at the time.

During this gumboot invasion the last thing I was thinking about was the fact that I had mistakenly left my reading glasses in my shirt pocket. As I bent down to get the chicken out of the gumboot the glasses fell out and landed on one of the chickens in the maul happening around my feet. They scattered to the wind taking the glasses with them.

I was stuck, I still had a chook in my gumboot.

There I was in the middle of a muddy yard, balancing on one slipping gumboot gently trying to remove the other and retrieve the protesting chicken. I was very lucky to get the chicken out of the boot without falling in the mud.

Then the search for my glasses began along with the rain. The chickens(being helpful little mites) all followed me for the entire search. Emitting calls that sounded something like - hot, hotter, no colder, cool.

After about half an hour I found the glasses and they were intact if a bit muddy.

The chickens looked quite pleased with themselves; after all they do try their best.