The Minnesota Farm Woman

There is an old adage that says “One cannot have a home without a rooster and a dog”.  I have both. In fact, I have seven roosters, 16 hens, and one Chihuahua. You would think that I would have a coop filled with baby chicks since spring is here,  but I don’t. All winter,  I was “henpecked” when I attempted to gather eggs each evening. They didn’t want me to take their potential babies, and I have the bruises to prove it.  This spring, I set up a private maternity ward area in the corner of the coop. I am not a “spring chicken” as most of you know, and this took a little work.  I was running around “like a chicken with my head cut off”  cleaning the coop and preparing for nesting time.  I nailed up an old tablecloth for a drape. I lovingly filled a box with fresh straw and wood shavings. In my mind, I pictured fluffy little yellow chicks, peeking out from under their mother’s wings. These “dumb clucks” who wanted to have babies all winter now want nothing to do with sitting on a clutch of eggs. There are now 14 eggs in the nest of all shapes, sizes and colors, and not one hen wants to sit.  They lay more there every day. I am getting “as mad as a wet hen” over this. Perhaps they are tired after “being all cooped up” over the long winter, because they are more interested in what is going on outside the coop, and every day, it sounds like they having some sort of “hen party”  with all the clucking going on, until I show up. Then they are quiet. I can tell when someone is talking behind my back. They have probably planned this all winter, knowing full well that I am “as dumb as a wooden rooster” when it comes to being a real Farm Woman. They are probably still “cackling”  over the time that I went in to feed them wearing my good sandals. I know that this is probably payback for stealing their babies all winter, because my grandmother used to tell me that “chickens always come home to roost”. Usually, I have many eggs to spare, but it seems that I have been “putting all of my eggs on one basket”,  as I don’t dare take any of the old eggs out of the nest, since I can’t tell which one is old and which one isn’t. What I should do is threaten them with the soup pot, but since I am too “chicken hearted”  to anything like that, I will be patient and perhaps have a “cocktail” while I am waiting.  Or two.  In case you were thinking this is some sort of “cock and bull story”, it is not. All of my stories are based on true life, but with some of them, I have to hurry and press the “publish” button before I “chicken out”.