Chicken Theater

Welcome to Chicken Theater.  Please do not expect high drama, exceptional moments of cuteness or comedy.  Chicken Theater is a meditation, a chance to relaxo and pretend you are at the rancho.  Come and get away from it all with Flo, Shortcake, Cupcake, Butterball, Halley and Simon.

Flo

Time to stop talking about vegetables and start talking about chickens. This is Flo. We don't know exactly how old she is anymore, but she is pretty darned old. When we moved into our last place about 4 or so years ago Flo was already there and already old. She was probably just entering henopause when we first met her. She would lay nice white eggs occasionally, but they started coming out with weird or no shells and eventually she stopped laying altogether. A couple of years ago we had some really intense heat which killed one of our hens. We have since learned that it is good practice to provide chickens with electrolytes on hot days (it's what chickens crave). Since they cool themselves down by panting, they exhale carbon dioxide and their blood can get too alkaline and whack them out pretty badly.

Anyhow, Flo looked like she was done for as well. She just melted into a dazed puddle. Even her comb was flopped over. She somehow managed to bounce back. In the meantime, we knew one of the chickens had been eating eggs. One day we caught Flo in the act. That explained her youthful new feathers and perky comb. She had become a vampire chicken! Since we are softies, we kept her around anyway and just checked the eggs as often as we could. All of the other chickens of her generation have since passed away but Flo just keeps on keeping on.

Go Flo!