I work an office job. Long hours, very busy, fairly
stressful, and find each moment away from my desk doing physical things like
fixing the forklift (I have no real idea how to fix a forklift!), moving product
around, coordinating things with one department or another … but mostly at a
desk glued to a phone and computer. Often with no time even to take a lunch, my
wife understands that I really can’t take social calls. So when she does have occasion
to call me at work, it is pretty damn important and I always take her call!
So it was on a day late in September. The weather was
perfect and she was to spend the day in the yard harvesting what was left in
the garden, preparing the ground for next season, and obsessing over our little
flock.
The call came late in the morning and I could tell right away
something was wrong. She collected herself and told me that Coq Au attacked
her. We hand raised this baby. He takes food out of our hand with the most
gentle care. I couldn’t believe it. I talked her down and told her she must’ve
been mistaken. She tried to tell me how he was all a flurry of feathers and
talons, but I just couldn’t see it.
Roosters have a reputation. They can be nasty. Some breeds
worse that others and one of the deciding factors for us against Rhode Island
Reds was their aggressive reputation. We had read plenty of stories on the
fancy chicken blogs of roosters who were sweet as pie and even liked to perch on
their owners’ laps. But we had also read the tales of sweet roosters gone bad
as soon as they hit an age where their testosterone was in full swing. Guess
which one we ended up with?
When I got home, before going in the house I stopped by the
flock and had a close look. Everyone seemed normal, including Coq Au. They all
gathered around and I presented some meal worms. While they were munching, and
I had their attention a bit, I asked them what happened, but they hushed up and
wouldn’t own up to a thing. I went to our front door, sighed deeply, and walked
in. My poor wife was sitting their brooding. Her face dark, and I knew this had
to be more than mere dramatics. She gave me the gory details. She was
completely unhurt, but so unnerved by the situation that it shattered her idyllic
vision of owning chickens and having livestock.
I’m a little more pragmatic in such areas, I like to think,
and figured a rooster is a rooster and just needs to get out a little
aggression once in a while and as soon as he learns who the boss is, there
would be little trouble. She and I also talked over the minutia and I mused
over factors like her floppy gardening hat … maybe he didn’t recognize her, or
the hat was casting a shadow that caused him to fear there was a threat. I went
over all of these things and as the days passed, she tried again and again to
enjoy the flock.
But he kept it up. Not every day. Not every encounter. But
randomly and with alarmingly increasing frequency. Then came the day he came
after me.
I was out in the yard with the flock foraging. It wasn’t a
total surprise, with the disturbing reports from my wife, I was keeping a bit
of an eye out. But he looked at me. I spied him looking at me and I looked at
him. We looked at each other and I could see the moment when he decided that
the flock was his, and his alone. I saw the moment when he decided he could ‘take’
me. He reared just a bit. His cowl expanded in a showy display, and then IT WAS
ON!
Quick as a wink it as feathers and talons and he was
determined to do bodily harm to my person. I quickly recovered my wits and let
fly with a booted kick. I missed. The bastard ducked. He came low. But try as
he might, he just wasn’t able to penetrate the armor of my blue jeans. Another
kick. I connected with him … a glancing blow to the chest. He was completely
undaunted and lunged again. A few more feints, another swing and a miss on my
part and then my kick landed squarely home. Right on his well-muscled breast
bone. Drove him back a foot or so.
Now, it is very important to remember that I was not trying
to hurt him. At no point in my life will I ever intentionally cause harm to an
animal. I was placing my kicks as carefully as possible to land on his breast
area … where he has the most muscle and where two fighting roosters would be
connecting with each other. The force of my kicks was tempered, although solid,
designed to be firm enough to send a message, but not the kind of force to punt
him into next week.
The second thing to remember is that a determined rooster
can ignore a well-placed kick that drives him back a foot or so and he will
require a second, third, or possibly more until he feels he can not achieve the
better of the battle.
That day, Coq Au required two well-placed kicks (and a few
glancing blows) until he walked off. He did turn his head briefly and say to me
“okay … I’ll LET you be in the same yard as me. FOR NOW!”
With that, my wife as completely vindicated and it became
clear, even to my thick mind, that Coq Au Vin was determined to do mischief.
Now, and likely for a time to come.
I knew this is what a rooster could become going into the whole
affair. I was hoping against hope that he would turn out to be one of the ‘sweet’
ones, but I also knew a rooster is to be a rooster. Evolution made him who he
is and it was now time to figure out what to do about it.
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