Or, Yes, I know It's Spelled...
A few weeks ago while dropping some kittens off at the Guilford County Animal Shelter I came upon a young Auracana chicken a couple of months short of laying her first egg. The folks at the animal shelter thought she was a young cockerel (rooster) but having had Auracana and Americana hens before I knew different. Five Dollars and some paperwork had me taking her home.
My best guess is that Annie hasn't seen another chicken since shortly after she was born until I introduced her to my flock. She understands none of the chicken rules, doesn't seem to speak the same language, sleeps on the ground instead of on a perch and prefers people over chickens. My other chickens will kill to get into the garden but when I put Annie into the garden she looked at me as if to say, Why are you putting me in this dirt? Then she promptly followed me out of the garden.
She really is precious, she'll come when I call, perch on my hand, loves to be petted, sleep in my lap, purr like a kitten, snuggle close to me... If you know chickens then you know it's weird for a hen to behave this way.
Little Orfan Annie didn't know how to scratch for bugs and worms like other chickens usually learn by the time they're 2 weeks old. Completely sheltered as someone's pet chicken, Annie never learned how to dig for worms or catch flies. She's still not very good at it but she is learning. And without other birds around to socialize with, Annie hasn't even learned basic bird grooming habits. You see, for chickens, grooming is a social activity that can be attempted but not completed alone. So until Annie learns to bond with the other chickens I guess I'll have to give her a bath. Note: Chickens do not like taking baths, trust me. If I could get out of it I would.
Annie knows nothing about flying, jumping or landing. When I pick her up I have to put her all the way back on the ground. If I allow her to jump from my hand she keeps her wings closed and lands on her head. It's not that she's dumb, it's just that she spent her life until now in a very tiny enclosure until her previous owner realized she had outgrown her box and took her to the animal shelter. Having never had the chance to stretch her wings, Little Orfan Annie is naive to the fact that she can stretch her wings. And while chickens Annie's age often fly, older chickens usually give up flying and all my girls have declared themselves grounded. Annie doesn't know she can fly and will never see other chickens fly having missed an entire developmental stage of her life.
Is she ever going to be surprised a month from now when those first turquoise blue-green eggs start popping out. That's right, Auracana chickens are one of 3 breeds that lay green eggs.
Greensboro is a lot like Little Orfan Annie. We've been railroaded and ripped-off by the local elite, developers, politricksters and their cronies for so long we don't know we can fly too. We've just become used to living in a city that hides the truth, doles out millions to millionaires and hides behind aliases that when the day comes when we finally lay our own golden egg we'll not even know what it is. But you can bet the people who kept us shut up in those tiny cages all those years will know exactly what it is and they plan on taking it.
Who's ready to start flogging?
PS. The Greensboro City Council was forced to grandfather my flock when they passed chicken restrictions several years ago.
