Bravery

 

Bravest thing in the world!

 

 

My brave hen has triumphed against the odds to bring five fledged chickens to roost in the chicken shed.

 

 

I put another big brick down over the place where the fox had dug a hole through under the chicken shed wall. I could see the scratch marks from the little claws in the dirt.

 

 

The previous night was her last with the brood over in the big hay shed where she had laid her clutch of eggs over a two week period in a scrape in the gravel between the wall and an old gate. After sitting almost exposed for three weeks the chickens finally hatched and scurried after her to another corner of the hay shed where she coddled them under her wings for another three weeks. The chickens quickly learned to come to her call and to loudly peep “wait for me!’ if they got caught behind.

 

 

I put out chicken crumbles and water for them, but they spent most of the day outdoors learning to scratch and pick around the goats and out in the paddock. The dog got one which strayed foolishly into his shed, but the other five survived.

 

 

The courage to lay an egg and leave it, furtively hoping nothing had been watching. To return in anxiety day after day to lay another, hoping the nest would still be intact. The fateful decision to sit on the eggs knowing everything is at stake. No protection for three weeks of cold, lonely, hungry, thirsty nights of waiting. No defense but anger and fluffed feathers. Hoping only to not be noticed, or heard, or smelt by a merciless prowler.

 

 

Praying the chickens would stay quiet when the fox came hunting around the sheds.

 

 

Bravest thing in the world!