Chicken Rescue

When it comes to bird care, I admit, I am usually in camp, "Run away!" Don't misunderstand, I love birds. I think they're great, fascinating things. But I think the same thing about tigers. I would just personally prefer neither on my front steps. Thankfully, there are some laws in North Dakota that mean I don't have to go around being a big jerk about it. (While it might be tempting to take home an injured bird, you're best to leave it alone. You can't keep wildlife without a permit to "Possess, Propagate, or Domesticate" from the North Dakota Game and Fish Department.) The PPD permit is issued through the Animal Health Division of the North Dakota Department of Agriculture. Good luck with that.

The state of North Dakota does allow you to own chickens. Which my sister-in-law, Annette, feels is very poor planning on their part.

Some people get dreamy eyed when you tell them that you have chickens. They envision some romantic, agrarian lifestyle which centers around egg collection for some reason. I have never experienced this effect, probably because A.) I am quite happy to get my eggs from the store, and B.) all the chickens which have ever been in the barnyard have been roosters.

This happens because of how a chicken develops. The stages being:

• Egg 
• Cute, fluffy chick stage 
• Ugly scruffy stage 

Then the chickens are ready to leave the safety of the hutch and roam the yard for a raccoon or fox to find. This time honored process leaves you with a number of roosters to harvest each fall. The trouble is, you only need so many roosters for attaining chickens the "non-Murray-McMurray-hatchery" way. 
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The Oldest Chicken Ever

Age and determination are how Caffè Latte came to live with us. He lived down the road with a group in a neighbor's hutch, but due to his age, he wasn't exactly thriving.  A little understood fact about chickens that Annette will point out to anyone thinking of buying them is that they are cannibalistic, pecking, buttholes. Chickens will find a member of their group with a flaw, and then peck at it until it dies. In many ways, they are a lot like some people I knew in High School. 

Long story short, even though I knew that a 6+ year old rooster was not going to make delicious chicken enchiladas, I agreed that Latte could come live here. I cannot tell you what sort of chicken he is. He only has one eye, and his spurs make me question his ability to sit carelessly, but at his age, truly, he's done raising families. I like to think of him as a tiny dinosaur. In appreciation for the forever home of chicken freedom he has been granted, he bravely came over to the camera on a February morning, and in a show of gratitude, watched, as I was clobbered by his cat friend, Brutus. Brutus is rather protective of Latte. I forgot.

The more observant of you readers might note that everybody seems to be eating the dog food. I suspect this is because you can feed anything Purina Dog Chow. It's just a theory, but so far, it has proven correct. And before chicken fanciers send me irate letters, let me point out that Latte has proper chicken feed. A LOT of it, actually. He just happens to prefer Purina Dog Chow. Because chickens are cannibals. Annette told you.