Co-existing in Greener Pastures

For a long time, my chickens Leah, Goldi Macaroni and Stella, were content in their little run. I brought them treats, and they ranged around eating bugs and leaves in addition to their chicken feed, all day. Slowly, slowly the green bits in their run started to disappear.

They started jumping up to peck at the leaves on the lowest branches of the trees. It was during one of those jumps that they probably noticed a land beyond. A land of tree stumps and leftover popsicle sticks covered with ants. A utopia of dead flower heads and radish seedlings. They were no longer content in their little run.

Around the same time their wings were growing stronger. They probably noticed that the poodle now took little notice of them, apart from the occasional tentative charge, for which she was typically scolded.

One day, I left the gate of their little run open so that I could supervise them ranging around the yard. Yummies everywhere! It was over. The seed was planted, and the wanderlust began.

Regularly, the girls would hop up on top of their coop, and from there easily clear their fence. It was fine. I had a fenced-in backyard. It would be too hard for them to clear the chain link fence around the yard, wouldn’t it? How naïve.

It might have been okay if my next door neighbor, recently retired and increasingly active in his own backyard, hadn’t noticed them, and been charmed by a visit from what he thought was a mini-flock of wild chickens. He tossed some corn around, and they made friends with him, and his yard. Away they went, every morning, and they always came back.

But one day, they didn’t. Nobody knew where they were. On that day, I had meetings with my boss in Manhattan. I couldn’t climb fences, call neighbors or bring out my own cup of tempting seeds. Children were offered rewards for finding them.  I prepared for the worst, but when I got home around sundown Miss B. had found them in another neighbor's yard, trapped behind their rosebushes.

I hate to clip their wings, because I know they will have a harder time getting away from predators now. The major predator, though, the one in my yard that I was most worried about, has become less of a concern and more of an ally.