Motherhood

Welcome to the Advent Calendar Story Train, where you can read through 24 stories under the theme Surprise.

The hen was nowhere to be found. We had about a dozen chickens and four ducks. The ducks would occasionally terrorize the chickens but for the most part the one rooster kept the ducks from their bullying. The hens, when broody, would find a nest and simply sit there and lay eggs, fertilized or not, and eventually there would or would not be a fresh bunch of chicks. Occasionally the mother to be would hide her nest, effectively disappearing for the three weeks or so for the eggs to hatch.

And one was missing. I didn’t name my chickens or ducks, but this one, Speckles, was named. She was clearly missing from the flock and was not in any of the regular nests. We had a big yard and I searched the bushes and flower beds to no avail. I let it go for the day and decided wherever she was, she’d be ok. Our yard dog was trained to guard the yard and protect the birds from predators so I wasn’t worried.

Next day and the next I looked for her, no Speckles. A week passed and I was getting a little worried. I checked the fig tree, where they roosted, every evening in case she abandoned the nest which they sometimes did, but she did not return to the roost.

Then one afternoon I was filling one of the many water bowels and old dishpans at the faucet near the stand of day lilies. This faucet came up from the ground about two feet and was flanked by a large spider lily plant which was in full bloom.

Between fillings I heard a low chicken sound coming from the day lilies, which were also in full bloom. I went over to them to investigate and sure enough, well hidden in the sea of green lilies was Speckles hunkered down in a nest of fonds. She changed her song to short shrill utterances of alarm when I gently felt under her for eggs. I would’ve had to move her off to count them so I could only guess from what I felt that there were more than a half dozen eggs.

Since she had been gone a week, I figured about two more weeks before hatching. Hens eat and drink less when they are on-the-nest, but I decided to make it easy for her to eat and brought her feed that she could reach without leaving the nest and put a small dish of water close by, as well. I checked her often and never found her anywhere but at the nest. 

Then, a couple of weeks after finding her, she was gone from the nest and nothing but broken egg shells remained. I then looked all about until I found her in one of the flower beds, clucking and scratching, surrounded by seven baby ducks. To both of our great surprise, the eggs had hatched into ducklings, not chicks. 

They were all clearly baby mallards, had flat web-feet and black and yellow down, the whole duck outfit. The birth-mother duck must’ve abandoned her clutch of eggs for some reason known only to the duck. Speckles found it and took over. For Speckles, they were her babies and knew only to teach them the ways of chickenhood.

However the ducklings found scratching on dry ground puzzling. Pecking the ground with their rounded bills was unproductive as well. Speckles fussed and clucked and carried on so that they nevertheless obediently followed their mother’s lead.

But they needed to eat so I brought special feed for ducklings to where they were doing their best and gave them something they could eat from the ground. Speckles seemed confused about what I was doing but could see her brood eating happily so she accepted my intervention.

She taught them to drink from the water bowels and that went better than the scratching lessons. All in all, it was going well. The ducklings were watered and fed and growing, following their clucking, scratching mother wherever she led them.

Then one day, I heard a loud ruckus coming from the backyard. I ran out to find the scene at the water faucet to be quite chaotic. Speckles was making a loud sound of alarm that I had never heard before. All the chickens and even the ducks and the yard dog were there watching as several of the ducklings were in the large wash tub full of water that was set aside for the mature ducks to bathe in. The ducklings were bathing and floating having quite the good time, while their mother was near fainting. The ducklings that weren’t in the water were wading about in the mud now surrounding the tub using their rounded bills to sift the murky water.

The mature ducks were, I think, laughing at the hen as she fussed and clucked at her babies for fear of them drowning, as chicks certainly would have. I tried to pick Speckles up to sooth her but she would have nothing to do with me. I stayed nearby just to witness this coming of age ceremony and eventually the continued good spirit of the ducklings was communicated to the concerned mother. 

Speckles gradually calmed down and found some dry ground to scratch and peck. She soon stopped calling the ducklings and rejoined the flock of other hens who were wandering about the yard, scratching and pecking.

Thank you for reading today’s story. The next one will be available to read on December 12th, titled “Christmas Surprise". The story will appear sometime tomorrow when the post goes live.

If you missed yesterday’s you can go and read it here.