Weekly Chicken Fix

Martha spent a few lonely days following me around the yard and hiding whenever I would disappear into the house. There was a steady undercurrent of near panic in her actions. No longer did she patrol the fence row or turn the compost pile seeking insects, her existence had become two extremes -- hiding or seeking reassurance from me.

The afternoon she climbed the stairs to the deck and perched herself on my forearm cooing with calm I contacted Spencer -- my partner in the chicken buy -- and asked him if I could buy one of the chickens back from him. Considering Martha's lonely state he was delighted to sell a chicken back to me and the following evening he delivered a Speckled Sussex. With the addition of Abigail, Martha is once again a member of a flock.

For the next few days I began to fear that Martha's paranoia was contagious. The two of them spent a lot of time hiding under the bushes at the end of the garden and Martha still required a lot of reassurance from me (with Abigail trailing along certainly puzzled by all this attention paid to a human) but the last two days has seen the pair ranging through the garden once again doing their scratch, scratch, peck, peck dance.