When I drive onto the property owned by my parents, Alec and Geneva Vaughan, I always look for the chickens.  Generally, they will hear my truck and come out from beneath the azaleas.  The area has been a rural place in the country for years and years. Being rural, chickens can free-range and roam the land only worrying about the hawks and racoons. Now-a-days it has become more populated with city-folk, neighbourhoods, people and cars zooming up the long road.  

My parents, who bought the Westside property in the 1960’s, have been gone for some time now but there are still chickens on the property.  I bought a 50 lb bag of corn and when I come, the chickens get a nice meal.  For a time there was a group of chickens, then a handful and finally just one lone hen.

When the lone hen began to nest, I went to a neighbour on the south end of Milson, a dirt road and bought 4 fertilized eggs for $5.00.  They were exchanged for the unfertilized  eggs under her.  In twenty-one days, she hatched three of the four eggs. They were tiny yellow birds that turned brown over time. She is white and she was one happy mama.

For a time I would see her and the babies in the front yard but for at least a month I would drive in and there was no sign of them until yesterday.  All three of the babies were with her and what a happy sight it was. They look like teenagers now, bigger and darker brown.  Of course, they were fed a nice meal.

Hopefully they will free-range nearby in the coming days.  The concern now,  is more than hawks and racoons getting them but cars, and trucks. ‘Hoping for the best.

See you tomorrow,