The Rooster From Hell

Sheila was in Monty's Feed and Seed, picking up supplies for her fainting goats and the dogs when she heard the cheep cheep of baby chicks. She had forgotten all about chick days starting this week. On the spur of the moment, Sheila went to look at them.

She wasn't planning on getting any chicks, but once Sheila saw them, she couldn't resist. She picked out 25 of them to take home, hoping that Steve wouldn't get angry that she had picked them up. She'd always wanted chickens, anyway, so Sheila was just going to do it, whether he wanted to or not.

Upon arriving at the house, all Steve said was that he wasn't going to feed them or clean out their coop. Which was just fine with Sheila, since she only wanted the chicks for herself. She enjoyed watching chickens strutting in the yard.

So over the next few weeks, Sheila had a coop built and took care of her chicks. She bought a shovel and rake for the coop, and bought fencing so they could have a pen to peck around in. She made up feed storage bins and watering troughs. Sheila painted the coop to look like a mini RV and planted sunflowers with daisies mixed around the pen and coop.

Once she was done, Sheila stood back and surveyed her work. She was very pleased with how it all turned out. It was like a little piece of a utopia in her backyard. The chicks all seemed to like it too.

The chicks at this point were all the size of pullets, with some being larger than the others. By the amount that was crowing, only 4 out of the 25 were roosters. Maybe 2 of the ones not crowing were kind of iffy on what they might be. So that left 19 pullets for sure. They were all getting their feathers in and they were such a beautiful shade of red Sheila had never seen. Which it made sense that they were red, she had picked out Rhode Island Reds, after all.

One little rooster stood out above the rest of the roosters. He had the brightest red feathers, with the prettiest green and black tail feathers coming in. He walked all over the chicken yard like he owned the whole place. This little cock had the biggest crow of all the males in the coop, with a nice yodel to it. Sheila named him Rojo

Knowing she'd have a huge problem later on, she built another coop with separate pens so Sheila could split up the excess roosters. She didn't want a bunch of fighting with the hens in the same pen, that may end up hurting them. She left Rojo in the pen with the hens.

Months go by, and winter comes and goes. Sheila had had the chicks for a full year. The hens had started laying by early spring and she was getting a whopping 16 eggs a day. She was literally running out of egg recipes to try and was tempted to experiment and see what type of meal she could create with the eggs. She had literally even gave some eggs away as gifts to her friends. Sheila was becoming known affectionately as the crazy chicken lady by all her friends.

Even though the chickens had gotten bigger, Sheila wasn't afraid of them. The hens were all friendly and lovable. The extra roosters even liked to be cuddled and cooed at. But Rojo was getting more and more aloft. He was getting very sneaky too.

One day, she felt a beak strike the back of her leg, and when Sheila turned around, there was Rojo, wings spread out, ready to peck her again. She reached down, and grabbed a hold of him, forcing him to accept her affection for the entire time she spent in the chicken pen that day.

For the next few weeks, Rojo seemed to be on his best behavior. He didn't try to attack her. Was nicer to the hens even. Sheila was still even picking him up and cuddling Rojo everyday. Things seemed to have been fixed.

Then one day, Sheila went out to the pen to check the chickens and clean their coop out. She was bending over to clean out a watering trough, when Rojo got her. This time it felt like she'd been shot in the thigh with a .22 bullet. Sheila screamed out, spun around and stood up as fast as she could, but she wasn't fast enough. That damn rooster got her again with the spurs.

Those spurs had really gotten longer over the past month. Sheila had been meaning to snip them for awhile now. She just kept forgetting to pick up the tool she needed at Monty's. Now she really regretted not remembering to do so.

She couldn't get away from him fast enough. Rojo got Sheila 3 more times with his spurs before she could make it 7 steps. She tripped over a water trough, and with quick thinking, right before he struck her again, Sheila flipped it over on him. She got up and ran back to her house.

Sheila got the bleeding to stop and bandaged her wounds after pouring antiseptic on them. She took some naproxen for the pain. She really wished she hadn't kept that rooster as she doctored herself up. The entire time, she was gripping and cussing about that damn rooster.

She decided then and there that it was high time for some chicken and dumplings. Or maybe some chicken and rice. Chicken fajitas sounded good....