Emily, the lonely chicken

Some women get to be the mother of dragons.  Not me.  My hair is not golden enough.  My family, not royal enough.  Me, I'm the mother of chickens.  Or chicken singular.  A sad, lonely girl at that. There is no doubt that she is depressed.  Her shoulders (yes chickens have shoulders) are hunched. Her eyes are dull.  Her movements are slow.  She rarely comes out of her coop to say hello and she hasn't given us an egg in over a week.  I'm no chicken expert but she definitely isn't the happy girl we've come to know and love.

Emily & her sister Pecky came to live with us over a year ago now and for a long time domestic bliss reigned.  We had fresh eggs everyday, sometimes twice a day.  Poppy, the dog took to her role as big sister with gusto and the three coexisted very happily.  Maybe too happily and we got complacent in our free ranging, until one day a couple of months ago, Pecky disappeared.  The trail of evidence lead to one very sheepish doggy, although to this day we haven't figured out exactly what happened.

Emily & Pecky settling in one their 1st day while Poppy looks on 

Cake baking with eggs fresh from the garden

Always the quieter of the two, Emily, took the loss badly.  She lost a lot of her feathers and she stopped laying for a few weeks but gradually she started to come out of her shell and she was back to being a healthy, happy chicken.  Although she has never fully regained her trust in Poppy.  A couple of weeks ago I started noticing her coming into the garden less and less.  When I'd check on her she would make a keening noise from inside the coop.  She needed encouragement to eat and drink.  I thought she was bound (thank you backyardchickens.com) but that wasn't the problem.  It never dawned on me that she might be lonely, neglectful mother that I am.  I mentioned it to a friend of mine who keeps hens and straight away he suggested that she had either been attacked or she was lonely.  There were no visible signs of distress or injury and so light bulb moment - Emily needs a friend.

Emily photobombing in happier times!!

Thankfully I've found a solution in the form of the wonderful hen rescue programme run by LittleHill Animal Rescue & Sanctuary and two new ladies are coming to live with us on Sunday.  During the month of July LittleHill aim to rescue and re-home over 1,000 chickens from battery farms.  They spend hours liasing with farmers, organising new homes and transportation and ask only that adoptive families contribute €5, which gets reabsorbed into the sanctuary.  

LittleHill operate a no kill policy, so that no animal in their care will ever be put to sleep, unless it is suffering.  I'm so happy to have come across the work that they do here.  I'm looking forward to introducing Emily to her new sisters and to once again having a fridge full of delicious fresh eggs. 

But for now Ì'm off to find my book of girls names and root out my knitting needles.  After all, I am the mother of chickens!!

A rescue chicken, complete with knitted jumper to keep her warm

http://littlehillanimalrescue.ie/

https://www.facebook.com/pages/LittleHill-Animal-Rescue-Sanctuary