The Chicken with the Will to Live

This little chicken was purchased at the farm store by the boys. They wanted to buy a chicken that would be raised for slaughter and let it live a long life. So, White Fowl came to live with us.

What a pampered chicken!

Then, one day, a mongoose attacked White Fowl. Enoch flew into action and hit the mongoose with a rock and got the chicken from him. Her neck was broken and she was gushing blood from two puncture wounds on her head.

We stopped the blood and put Sinklebible (Aloe Vera) on them to prevent infection, but the broken neck! What could we do? Our visiting friends said to make Chicken fricassee. Others said to put her out of her misery. The internet gave no hope. Our local vet from RADA instructed us to splint her neck. And a visiting doctor actually took the time to put on the splint.

White Fowl was making it through all types of hardships. Gaping wounds. A broken neck. Sores under the splint. Losing her feathers almost to the point of nakedness. Loving but ignorant caregivers.

Lots of people gave her energy. She had a Red Chicken who was her companion before the attack. He stayed with her through thick and thin. He rested with her during the day and slept with her at night. The boys captured every spider around and dug up mulch piles to find cockroaches to feed her. At one point, with her feathers grey and straggly, feeding her mash through a pipette, Enoch petted her little head and said, “You are so cute! You are unstoppable!”

When her splint was removed after three weeks, she actually sang with happiness. At first, she couldn’t walk, but she could stand. Then, she could only walk in a circle, backwards. And she would keep her neck totally twisted around and rested on the ground.

But now, two months after the mongoose attack, she ranges her little protected living area under the mango tree. She hasn’t mastered walking in a totally straight line, but she goes where she wants to go. Her feathers have grown back and are luxuriant and healthy. She holds her head at a lean, but it is held straighter every day. Red Chicken is still devoted.

Moral of the story: When faced with the worst, don’t give in. A strong will to live, fed by loving energy, can prove the naysayers wrong. Defy the ones who say “Chicken fricassee”!

Please send a loving thought to White Chicken, who still needs to heal so she can live a full, long life.

Update: White Chicken, now called Took Took, is as big as a house. She walks confidently all around her home around a mango tree. We got lazy and stopped the daily physical therapy, so her neck has a permanent sideways tilt, but she can peck for her food with precision. She lays eggs! Her eggs are unfertilized because Red Chicken, actually Red Rooster as we should call him, found a harem of women to roam with and never comes to visit his old flame. We love her still, so hopefully she doesn’t even miss him.