A Basket of Eggs

My son-in-law and I are busy getting ready to become poultry keepers. I grew up with Bantam hens in our garden. There were always at least six of the little darlings wondering around laying eggs in hedges and roosting in the trees. Every few weeks a little clutch of chicks would be proudly brought out of hiding by a proud mother. The extremely sweet yellow chicks would be guarded by the protective hen as she encouraged them to eat the mash that was put out for them. Not all the eggs were allowed to mature. We had fresh eggs in our fridge from our layers most weeks. Our garden was improved by the gentle clucking of the hens as they scratched for worms and went about their business. The by-laws of the town permitted the keeping of cockerels which were never repealed even if the neighbours wished that the law was amended. The beautiful males strutted around when they were not about to attack each other in order to determine domination. The hens indulged themselves in pecking order squabbles which reminded me of some of the interactions I had with my peers. I never liked the noisy fighting of either the hens nor the cockerels. The latter were particularly vicious. My mother loathed the cockerels aggression to the point where my father eventually accepted that all male chicks were to be given away before they came of age.
The hens were bantams of various breeds which meant that they were not particularly large. Their size was not a reflection of their personalities. Each one was an individual. If you have never kept poultry you may be foregiven for assuming that one hen is pretty much like any other. Such is rarely the case. One of the pleasures of being an owner of birds is that you discover the quirks of each bird. My father was not a sentimental man but he had one little bird that he adored. She was a speckled black and white bird who seemed to share an enthusiasm for my father's presence. When he stepped out of the back door she would call out and wait to follow him around the garden. It helped that he often pulled up weeds so that she could find worms but regardless of what he did she would cluck after him. He would laugh at her antics as they wondered around the orchard in the late afternoon. I think she considered herself something apart from the other hens. She would fly up onto the stable door of the kitchen and sit there requesting attention rather loudly until one of us responded.
Another of the hens found herself a wonderful protected nest in the form of basket kept on top of a kitchen cupboard. She would fly up to it, squawk as she got into it and then settle down with a great show. The removal of the basket in an attempt to stop her from laying in the kitchen (determined extremely unhygienic by both parents) did not prevent her from continuing her practice. The problem was that she had always sat in the basket facing the wall. So when the basket was removed she laid her eggs with the result that the eggs would drop onto the counter below! After a few days of shouting at her when she came near the door, or when she was found settling down on the top of the cupboard we surrendered. The basket was put back with a fresh lining of plastic and newspaper which was changed every day.
We had one bantam who would lead the charge when the morning food was put out. Swooping down from a shrub the hen would rush to the mash as if she had not been fed for days. Her noisy clucking was the alarm for all the other hens who would follow suit. I think they suffered from a degree of anxiety that the greediest of them would eat the entire meal before they could have more than a single peck. The hens were the managers of the pest control regime of the garden. From the mid-1960s my father took the unusual step of not using most pesticides in his garden. He chose to loose a percentage of all his harvests to pest rather than use the extremely dangerous pesticides then on the market. Which was the major reason for us keeping hens. As bug eaters they were excellent. The problem was that they could be less than discriminating when it came to the one thing in the garden of which my father was most proud - the orchard.
My brother and I were taught how to throw the nets over the fruit trees and spent many hours hanging home made aluminum foil flags to help deter both the wild birds and the hens. Both proved fairly effective. The loss of some of his beloved yellow cling peaches and other fruit to the becks of his admired hens caused some moaning but in general was acceptable. My vegetable garden had to be protected by netting which was often infiltrated by the claws and beaks of the bantams. Swearing did not have any effect neither did wild arm waving and shrieking. I eventually accepted that I had to plant a portion of my crop for the hens.
So I am looking forward to being reintroduced to bantams. I will have new challenges in the form of less space, more wild animals eager to have an easily available meal and a different environment but with this new fangled google thing on hand I might just be able to keep them alive and well. My memories of bantams are fond ones so I look forward to forming new ones with my family.
On a sad note my father's Speckled Hen was assasinated due to a misunderstanding between the gardener and my mother. She ended up being peri-peried and served at the table aftern which my father refused to eat chicken for years and never ate peri-peried chicken ever again! Who could blame him.