You Use To Be A Beautiful Baby - And - By The Skin Of His Teeth

Ok...... well everyone that knows me knows how much I love me chickens.... it drives me maties here crazy, cos, to be honest, they DONT DO animals of any description.... and me matie Ann, well, she has this fear of birds, daft cow lol....

My chickens are wellabit spoilt, I buy them lavendar or lemon scented sawdust for the bottom of their bedroom in the coop and then I fill it up with warm snuggly herby scented hay LOL..... my chickens come out of their coop in the morning smelling like they have spent a night in a brothel.....

They all bring me such joy, I could sit in me garden and just watch them for hours, when Im stressed out, which has been a lot of late, I take me cuppa tea and go sit on the bench in the garden and me chickens bring me back down to earth....... no 'shop ya stress away' for me.... just sitting amongst the chicken poo and sharing me marmite toast with them, see how low maintenance I really am LOL

Do you remember the hatching of Marble back in October, when it was bitter cold and still I let mother nature run its course and let Mabel the mum warm and protect the chick instead of bringing them both into the warm kitchen in a box......

Well, little Marble is no longer a cute little fluffy chick...... he/she, but we are thinking more a he as the weeks go on... is now a big as its mum...its a tad crazy and skitsie and gets a right proper peck from its Auntie Janet when it gets to greedy....

It use to be a beautiful baby, but it sure is one ugly teenager LOL



And and even ugly looking young adult..



But ya see, no matter if Marble does turn out to be a cockeral, which I think it might be, cos it has shiney feathers like Cedric and has the beginnings of those purplely/green tail feathers, I will still keep him and Marble and Cedric will just have to learn to get on with each other, cos I loves my little Marble, its like me first born LOL

My chickens hang around together all day, they are never more then a few feet apart, sometimes they can be a pain in the arse, like NOW for instances, they have dug up all me perennials which I will have to replace, so I thought I would have to pen them down in the bottom half of me garden, still a large area for free chickens, so I went to B&Q and bought the most lovely picket gate and the hinges and thought I would put a gate up near the shed to stop them coming this end of the garden and destroying the rest of me plants....... So, last week I let them out of their coop and shut the new gate which is about 4 foot high and went out for the morning, happy in the knowledge that I could buy some new plants and they would not be dug up and scratched out by me chickens........



This is us buying the picket gate, thats Sprite, D and J... who says shopping with 3 under 3s is hard :)

WRONG..... when I came back home I opened me side gate and there was Cedric and Janet sitting on me back door step THIS SIDE OF THE GATE..... boy, did I tell them off, they must of missed me so much that they made a mad escape and must of fluttered up onto the gate (which must of been hard cos they are fatties) and where sitting there waiting for my return with a smug look on their faces...... after checking and opening the new gate I walked back up the garden talking to the pair of them in a cross voice....LOL and was explaining to them that they are NOT allowed this end of the garden and to bloody well get their arse back down the garden and through the gate, as they started to waddle off I quickened me step and made shooing noises, much to Cedrics annoyance lol he started with the back chat and noise at me as he picked up pace.... again I was giving him a piece of me mind when he decided to hop onto the gate and then onto the bloody 6 foot fence.... LMFAO..... little sod, he was determined to state his case and not go back without a fight LMFAO....

So I shooed Janet in through the gate and shut it and then went to pick Cedric off the fence.....



He was having none of it..... he fluttered down into me twat neighbours garden LOL.....dam and bugger, time for reinforcements..... I ran, well hobbled back to the house and shouted for Sam and Jacob to come quick.... Sam easily climbed over the fence and then from his side said, dammit, mum, Cedric's hopped over into the next garden........... and with that, we heard the most scariest noise that I have ever heard a chicken make and the growling of the little terrier dog that lives there..... Cedric was being attacked..... but he was putting up a good fight, boy could that cockeral run.... I screamed real loud from my side of the fence and both Sam and Jacob leapt over the other fence into the garden where Max the terrier lives and who by now had Cedric in his mouth...... the lady that lives there came rushing out, she to was screaming cos she could hear me screaming, I felt helpless this side of the fence..... Sam apparently without fear grab Max the dog by his neck and bashed him on the nose with the palm of his hand and the dog dropped Cedric, who at first lay there where he was dropped..... I by then had run/hobbled down me garden and in through the bottom of me neighbours garden (2 gardens along) thinking that my Cedric had been ripped to pieces, already the tears were rolling down me face...... the dog had been shut in the house and I could see feathers everywhere..... Jacob said, its ok mum, he is still alive, go get a towel, so I hobbled back through the gardens in floods of tears.... wishing I had clipped the chickens wings which would of stopped their ability of fluttering up over the fence in the first place..... as I hobbled back down the garden with towel in hand I heard my Sam in the twat neighbours garden saying, mum I'll pass Cedric over the fence and then climb over....



I dont know why this photo has come out so dark (ok photo swapped fanks LadyStyx for making me photo lighter) that thats our Sam climbing back over the fence and Jacob who had come the sensible way and through the back gate LOL


I heard me twat neighbour shuffling down his garden, just as Sam jumped back over the fence into our garden.......whats going on he said from his side of the fence....... nuffin we said in unison lol.... was you in my garden, he said.... nope we all said in unison..... with that we quietly tiptoed back up our garden and left the loon talking to himself LOL

I checked Cedric all over.... he was missing all his tail feathers and his bum was bare with a couple of bite marks on his arse.... so not knowing what to do I just put antiseptic cream on the bites and hugged him and give him a kiss and a right proper telling off and put him to bed.... hoping against all hope that he would not die of shock during the night.....



This is Cedric before, with his beautiful tail feathers.....

and, yes Cedric did survive the night..... by the skin of his teeth he survived....



This is Cedric now with what is left of his tail feathers...LMFAO.. I know they will grow back, I know he had a lucky escape... I know now I need to think about clipping his and the others wings..... and now I know just how much I love him.... aint I bloody pathetic lmfao....



As a treat the following day.... I gave them all a slice of chocolate cake.... one of their favourites lol..... note Cedrics tail-less bum lmfao.....



Oh, and cheese, did I mention they love cheese for their breakfast some mornings....

I could go on and on and show hundreds of photos and tell stories about me chickens, but I will save them for another day.....

Its bright and sunny here today with a nippy start.... looks like its gonna be a lovely spring day..... I need to make the most of it......

Enough boring Twaddle for one morning...

x

ps...... Fanks (((((Starr))))) you know what for.... feet - earth - ground.. oxo

Addition - a couple of other photos that I couldnt find this morning....