The Ugly Chickling
When we ordered our first batch of "meat birds" I forgot to check off a box on the order form so the supplier would not send a free bird. Some places include extra birds of the same variety that you have ordered, in case there is an accidental "loss" during shipment. Other places send any old free male bird they have to cover their butts and find homes for the extra male peeps. My order arrived, 25 of the most adorable, yellow fuzzy peeps and a chipmunk. Okay it wasn't a chipmunk but it sure looked like one with a beak. It was half the size of the other peeps and twice as fast. We started calling it Freebird, wondering what the heck it was going to grow into.
Freebird would hang out with his peeps, sleeping in between or on top of them to keep nice toasty warm. The other birds grew much faster, filling out nice and plump. After all they were meant to be used for a different purpose, food. The day finally came; all of Freebird's friends had to go to the Salon. Here was this gangly half naked long legged, funny colored bird with one bent toe, all alone now. He was only 8 weeks old but his feathers didn't seem to have grown properly to completely cover his out of proportion chicken body. I figure what could I do, he will adjust to hanging with the big birds easily enough. So that was it, he was in the big bird pen with all full grown chickens.
Free's first day was pretty rough, he kept chirping, looking for his friends, avoiding all the other chickens. He was endlessly running around the pen chirping. The next day while I was cleaning the pen, I noticed he was falling asleep on his feet. Then he would awaken, jump up and start chirping. I bent over the poor little thing to see if something was wrong. Free leaped into my arms, snuggled down against my stomach and went promptly to sleep. What do I do now? There are tons of chores to be done and I have a bird sleeping in my hands. This is very odd behavior for any chicken but Freebird isn't just any old chicken.
Slowly I finished a few of my chores with this strange looking bird tucked into my coat, sleeping. When he finally woke up I did attempt to place him back on the floor of the pen. This created a ruckus, Free screeched running after me, beating him self against the chicken wire to reach me. I opened up the door he ran to me leaping at high chicken speed into my hands, again. Now I really have a new friend. I do what any other sane person would do. Go get the bird condo out of the barn, set it up on my dinning room table and deposit this gangly youngster into it. Freebird could not seem to settle down in his new surroundings. He had fresh wood chips, feed and water. Then I thought he was used to being surrounded by fat fluffy birds, sleeping in between or on them. So over to the rag bag I go and picked out a few old towels. Free now had a nice soft padded bed to rest on in the corner of his condo. This did the trick he went over, flopped down on his bed and fell fast asleep. When Chickens are young they just flop anywhere and fall asleep, as they mature they will learn to roost. This flopping bird thing can be pretty scary when you get your first batch of birds. My first experience put me in a panic, OMG a box full of dead birds, until they woke up at the sound of my screams.
Freebird's nap lasted until about dinner time then he started calling for his friends which are now very long gone. I take out another old rag towel and pick up Free to see if he will calm down a bit. The little ugly monkey happily sat in my arms snuggling into his towel and spent the evening watching TV with us. Now I'm tired, wanting to go to bed myself but what can I do with this lost little urchin? Carefully I tuck the sleepy head on his bed and put a towel over him. The towel wiggles, gives a few squawks and Free goes out cold to sleep or so I thought. As I'm leaving the room the blanked starts to pop up and down, twittering. Quietly I sneak back over tuck the towel under the edges of his bed, gently pad him down. This time it works, off to bed I go.
In the morning it was pretty cold in the house, we keep the heat low. Bruce goes downstairs first to get ready for work. He goes through the dinning room where Freebird is parked but there is no sign of Free in his cage. Of course Bruce just ignores this fact and gets ready for work. Later when he wakes me up, I ask about Free, he calmly tells me he didn't see any bird. I panic, run downstairs and start calling around for Free. That’s when the pile of towels in the corner of the cage chirp back at me with a little bob up and down. Finally out pops a head, more chirps but that’s it. Somebody is no dummy, realizing it is cold and would not come out from under his covers! We keep the house at about 50 or 55 until we can not take it any more. Obviously the bird didn't like it either.
We do our chores, toss feed and treats into Free's condo and off we go to work. He is safe in his cage, alone all day but safe and warm (sort of). I did worry all day about him being all alone in that cage until we finally arrived home. There was Free, hopping around his condo, chirping happily away to Herman who was lounging up against Free's condo. This would be the daily routine for most of the time Free spent inside growing feathers while we were at work.
In the evenings we started letting Free have run of the house with the dogs and cats. Yes it sounds crazy, that about sums it up. He would follow me everywhere, if I was out of sight there would be a loud screech. I would call out to him and he would come running to me with those large gangly feet slapping on the wood floors. You would have thought he was an ostrich hunting me down. Slap, slap, slap Screech, Slap, Slap, Slap, with four dogs and a cat joining him.
In the evenings the dogs' line up for their daily salad or veggie treats, while I'm making dinner. Now there was one extra in the line up waiting for his tiny tidbit of tomato or lettuce to be tossed to him. This would absolutely vex Pumpkin to no end. To her it was bad enough to share a throw rug or the dog bed with the featherless thing but now treats. Every chance Free had, he would snuggle up to a dog for a nice nap. Every now and then Free would try to groom the dogs, that went over like a ton of chicken poop. Sharp beak, shiny puppy eyes and floppy ears, not such a good combination but the dogs tolerated Free pretty well.
The best part was after dinner, I would get Freebird's towel, and he would hop up into my arms. Maddie would be in my lap, Pumpkin at my feet, Max squished in the chair next to me and Free on my shoulder or chest, sleeping with his beak in my ear. This routine went on for about two weeks during which Free slowly grew more feathers. I would open up the back door every now and then giving him the choice to run outside and play for a while, knowing one day he would join the flock.
That’s exactly what Freebird did. One day over the weekend, he went out to play, ran to the barn and it was much less scary to him. He was a bird, not a dog, cat or human and all those other creatures out there were just like him. He chose to stay in the barn. Though when ever I was outside doing chores Free would follow me around happily chirping, begging for neck and chin rubs. Slowly he grew into a big (very) boy bird who now "tolerates" me giving him hugs and chin rubs. He will still return the grooming, giving me kisses every now and then if I'm lucky. As you can see Freebird has grown into a incredibly beautiful rooster.
