City Chickens Part II

Speaking of chickens . . . they are trouble. Also, as a side note, my friend pointed out on my last city chicken post that these are really not "city chickens” at all – possibly suburban chickens. Anyway, my brother-in-law Troy has a weekly post entitled “Corn Grows” that documents (as you might have guessed) how his corn is growing. Look there to see how early corn ought to look. Look here to see how early corn should not look. Perhaps I will title this “Corn Tries to Grow.” It tries alright, but our chickens peck it to bits. I didn’t know chickens ate greens! I thought they ate bugs and grain and people food (if you are not careful when snacking outside). But, it turns out they are ruthless with our little greens. Corn seems to be their favorite, but they have destroyed a zucchini plant, ate every one of the 3 zillion sunflower seeds I planted along our back hill, and are moving on to our tomatoes and peas now that the corn has served its usefulness. Look at them – caught red handed and trying to pretend like they know nothing! I was so excited to have corn and pumpkins in my backyard this fall (even though I won’t be here). It wasn’t even that I wanted to eat it that badly – I mean, I did, corn is delicious – but I just love autumn and cornstalks and pumpkins and fall leaves and I was so excited to have some of these things right in my yard! Bad bad chickens. I think perhaps that they are, as of yet, unaware of the delicate thread that a chicken’s life dangles by. If they knew, I wonder how my corn would look.

On an unrelated note, Abe tried (unsuccessfully) to teach Penny how to “play dead” the other day. Then, this morning, he was very excited to show me that he had taught her a new trick – how to sit when commanded. Something seems not quite right about this.