when chicks become hens

cute, fluffy babies no longer; silky and sweet little sophie, joan, peggy and pearl will soon be off to their real home that has lots of grass and worms from the ground (and not from the pet shop) and hopefully equally as much love! cheep cheep.

if you feel like reading a lovely story with chickens in it, try thurley fowler's the green wind and the wind is silver (but you'll have to get them from the library, or borrow them off me, because they are very sadly out of print) - so the chickens aren't the main attraction, but oh for being a young boy in the 1940s and here's to smuggling your favourite pet hen into the house by putting it down your shirt. (err...) but seriously, these are two lovely books about a family sticking it out through the tough post-war years on their farm in outback australia. jennifer, the main character, is sort of an australian anne shirley.

and there are chickens. sometimes on the dinner table as well as in the chook shed. (that will NEVER happen to our babies though!)