Country life
Fowl business
Leanda de Lisle
The chicken breeder in Nuneaton has been robbed again. The last time we visited he'd just caught a vixen that had been stealing his birds. She had put her head straight into a noose he'd placed halfway down his 8ft-high exterior fence and he'd shown us a picture of her hanging from it. This time the thieves were travellers. I waited for the breeder to show me a neck- lace of human ears.
However, there were no grizzly memen- tos. The travellers had escaped taking sev- eral game birds, each worth £300 or £400, with them. 'They use them for fights,' the breeder explained bitterly. We were look- mg for cheaper and gentler-natured birds, but what kind? The breeder had row upon row of chickens in every size, shape and colour, from great golden Buff Orpingtons t° tiny Black Frizzles. We decided to wait to see which the children liked and which hens we would be allowed to take away without a cockerel.
One cockerel in our backyard is enough, especially when it is Pepe, the miniature Lavender Arucana. Forget game birds, this chicken makes Ridley Scott's gladiator Maximus look like a wimp. Russell Crowe? Pah, you should hear Pepe crow — and he's quite a survivor. All the chickens that we bought with Pepe are dead, save one hen who dotes on him. They died of old age it's true, but the point is Pepe must be 102 in chicken years and he looks as good as he did in his prime. We have the picture to prove it.
As we walked through the narrow passageways between the pens and stacked cages, I told the breeder that we had had all the birds we had bought from him on our last trip immortalised by an artist. Our Light Sussex with their snowy bodies and sooty tails, our lion-coloured Buff Pekins, are still with us, in a jungle setting, hanging on the kitchen wall. The breeder was delighted, and when we told him the artist's name it transpired he knew him. The very same man had illustrated his business cards and he'd known his father, who had been a chicken painter before him.
After an hour of chat the time came to make our fowl decisions. I chose a mid- sized brown-coloured 'Cream' Leg Barr, a bird that has Arucana in it and lays the same extraordinary blue eggs. The children went for fatter, fluffier birds, picking a plat- inum blonde Orpington and two Brahmas, one buff and one black. This last one is particularly fine, with a positive explosion of feathers on her tremendous powder-puff bottom. But Pepe didn't pay her much attention when we took her out of her cardboard travel box and dropped her in his run. He made a beeline for the Orpington.
With the little old lady hen calling and fussing in the background, Pepe made sev- eral attempts to mount what he clearly con- sidered to be the most attractive addition to his new harem. 'I thinks he want to have sex,' I said, stating the obvious. 'Why don't they just have sex, then?' demanded my youngest son. 'How like a man,' I thought to myself, but replied, 'Perhaps she feels it's a bit early in their relationship.' I topped up the food and water, and then told the children it was time we left the chickens to settle in for the night.
My youngest son was out of the house at dawn to check that the new hens were all well. Two had laid and he ran in with their eggs, crying that the fair-feathered chicken was bleeding. I had to help him move Pepe and the hag hen into a different run straight away. I did as I was asked. 'Well, Pepe,' I said as I shut the door on them, `they say gentlemen prefer blondes, but you ain't no gentleman.' It's a tough old world in the chicken coop.
Previous page
