Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: I cannot say why exactly, but somehow I can’t resist a good chicken photo and these two little girls with their beloved roosters was a must have. My mother, deeply involved in and experience in the particulars of animal rescue and rehabilitation, has told me great stories of chickens as pets. Frankly, without being entirely conscious of it, I mentally ascribed these to being hens in my mind. Here is proof positive that I was being sexist in my thinking. A quick check in with our know-it-all friend Google and I am assured that roosters also make great pets – easiest of course if raised to be a pet, but evidently full grown roosters are not precluded from becoming your pal.

Best known for waking folks up early, I gather they have compensating charms as pets. (There is an upfront warning that you should never play fight with your rooster. I am not sure it would have occurred to me, but I was taught in kitten school – required for the acquisition of Cookie and Blackie – that you should play fight with kittens either, no monster under the blanket game recommended.) Roosters, we are told, are evidently smart and will follow you around devotedly in a dog like fashion and can be house trained. (Not surprisingly this sounded arduous.) There was a lot of discussion for the need of hens (preferably 2-6) to maintain optimum happiness, or faux hens – I will spare you those details.

Although this card was never mailed as such, written on the back in a neat but hard to read ink script is the following: Be a good girl and do what Emma tells you write me all the news – How many Bundles can you make mornings now? has Mamma come over yet? Be good to the Kiddies – Papa. It is addressed only to Miriam Loder and was presumably delivered by hand.

I have a somewhat indistinct memory of a video my mother had, made by people who kept a pet hen in the house and all about her. She seemed to reside predominantly in sort of an enclosed front parlor room. The family adored her and she was as much of a pet as a cat. As pets chickens live an average of 8-10 years. However, my mother had another story of a friend who bought chickens which went rogue and promptly roosted in her trees and drove her insane which is another side of that story. Roosters are, of course, early risers and I suppose this should be taken foremost into consideration before adopting them – but of course Blackie wakes us every morning between 4:30 and 5:00 and we still love him. Meanwhile, these girls have scooped these guys up as summertime pets, and one wonders if the girls were therefore also junior vegetarians in the making.