Blue Ridge Country March/April 2024 - 10

Charlotte
Nine Chicks in a Henhouse
How a Rhode Island Red hen resumes motherhood.
TEXT AND PHOTO BY BRUCE INGRAM | PHOTO STYLING BY JANETTE SPENCER
C
harlotte is an attentive mother
and tenderly cares for her offspring,
except when they first
enter into this world. Then she gives
them a sharp peck on their tiny heads
as if to say, as my wife Elaine claims,
" You'd better listen to me, I'm your
mother. "
Which explains why I am warning
our grandsons Sam and Eli, ages
11 and 9, not to be alarmed when we
sneakily bring nine chicks to Charlotte's
henhouse, and she, well, attacks them.
Why this occurs needs explanation.
Four-year-old Charlotte is a heritage
Rhode Island Red hen, and for
four consecutive springs she " has gone
broody, " which means she sits on a
clutch of eggs for 21 days before they
hatch. Tragically, in my opinion, modern
day " industrial " hybrid chickens
have had the trait of broodiness bred
out of them ... which just seems wrong.
Purebred chickens, like the ones our
ancestors raised in these mountains for
centuries, have simply gone out of style.
About 10 years ago, Elaine and I revolted
against this trend, partly to honor
her Ashe County, North Carolina,
and my Franklin County, Virginia, ancestors
who reared heritage birds and
partly to keep this tradition alive. So we
found a supplier of heritage Reds, and
began raising them.
Charlotte has been a model broody
until one recent evening (unknown to
us) when she made a terrible decision.
One of the other hens laid an egg in a
corner of the henhouse, and for some
bizarre reason known only to Charlotte,
she left her nest to sit all night on
a single egg. This, of course, caused the
developing chicks to succumb in their
eggs as the night proved a very cool one.
After much discussion on what to
do, Elaine and I decided to contact our
supplier and order 18 heritage Rhode
Island Red day-old
chicks, half of
which will go to Debbie Harris, a fellow
Botetourt County, Virginia, rural
resident.
So on this day, Elaine has risen early
to go to the post office and transport
home the now two-day-old chicks to
our basement where Sam, Eli and I
await. As the three of us hover over a
small enclosure, Elaine releases the 18
starving little fur balls which we have to
teach how to drink. We dip each one's
beak into the waterer to give them some
much needed liquid, and their natural
pecking instinct enables them to take
Nourished and refreshed, Charlotte enters the henhouse and
discovers that instead of one fake egg in her nest,
there now reside nine very vigorous chicks-
a miracle of epic proportions if there ever was one.
10 BLUERIDGECOUNTRY.COM
Eli and Sam share duties with Charlotte's
new chicks.
advantage of chick feed crumbles.
Next, I charge Sam and Eli with
the task of deciding which birds will
become Charlotte's next generation of
young. As the boys select chicks, they
name them...giving them such strange
appellations as Boots and Ruffles which
makes sense in an odd sort of way.
Chicks selected and christened, I
allow Eli (since Sam had the honor of
first selecting and naming the chicks)
to slowly and carefully carry a chickfilled
carton to the henhouse. Before
he arrives, I pick up Charlotte, who is
sitting on a hard plastic egg, and her
nesting box and place them outside
the henhouse. She immediately takes
that opportunity to visit the feeder and
waterer while Eli and I sneakily release
the nine chicks into the henhouse.
Breathlessly, Elaine, the grandsons
and I wait by the coup's back window
to see if Charlotte will fall for our
subterfuge. Nourished and refreshed,
Charlotte
enters the henhouse and
discovers that instead of one fake egg
in her nest, there now reside nine very
vigorous chicks-a miracle
of epic
proportions if there ever was one.
Charlotte seems briefly confused
about this stunning turn of events,
but then gives each one of the chicks
a hard peck on the head. And our next
generation of chickens has officially
come into existence.
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Blue Ridge Country March/April 2024

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