Why Did the Chick Cross the Road?

Meet (Little Orphan) Annie

I thought I’d squashed it.

I held my breath as I checked my mirrors, shifted my van into reverse, and rolled back from the traffic light.

There, in the middle of the turn lane, was a bird. But not the typical bird you’d expect to see at an intersection.

A chick. As in, a baby chicken.

I jabbed the hazard button, threw the stick into park, and opened my door.

“Please don’t be squashed, please don’t be squashed,” I prayed as I slowly approached the little creature.

As if it had heard me, it popped up and began running across the lanes. Definitely NOT squashed!

Desperately keeping an eye out for cars (which were blessedly non-existent at this typically busy intersection on a main route), I pursued the peeping chick. A motorcyclist pulled up at the light, and the chick stopped dead next to his resting booted foot. The rider watched, bemused as I scooped up the fluff ball and waved a “Thanks, bye” to him as I headed back to my idling car.

My brain was racing. My only guess is that this little adventurer had escaped from the Tractor Supply across the four-lane roadway and up the hill. What does one do with a baby chicken they’ve rescued?

I closed my door, fastened my seat belt and placed the chick in my lap.

We’d moved to New Hampshire six months prior, had our third baby three months after that, and picked up our first flock of layer chicks with said babe in arms. Being chicken newbies, we didn’t realize getting the chicks that early had committed us to two months of containing them in a brooder on our porch before the weather was nice enough for them to move out. We’d only just gotten them into their coop the week before, and my husband was beyond ready to see the back of them.

How would he react to having to start all over?

“All hands on deck!” I shouted overdramatically as I came through my front door. My panicked husband came racing, then stopped, puzzled yet relieved, as he realized what I was holding.

“And here I thought someone was mortally injured,” he shook his head and went to gather the brooder supplies that we’d only just put into storage.

He’s a good man.

That night, we kept checking in on the tiny chick. She was healthy, but by the morning she definitely seemed depressed. Yes, chickens can look depressed.

“They’re not supposed to be alone,” I told my husband. “And she’s too little to put out with the others.”

So off to Tractor Supply we went, discovered she was a Black Austrolorpe, and selected 3 new flock mates for her. I turned to head to the register when my husband stopped me.

“Well, wait. I mean, what’s a few more, right? These Americaunas lay the blue eggs…that’d be really cool.”

And so three flock mates became seven, and the theory of chicken math was supported.

As soon as we introduced our Little Orphan Annie to her new friends, she perked right up.

Three years later, Annie rules the roost and our hearts, even as we care for our new batch of layer chicks.