Yesterday I came home from church to find a note on my door. It had a man’s name and number on it with the cryptic message “Need to talk about chickens.”

At first I wondered if perhaps a neighbor was tired of the roosters crowing, or that maybe some hens had gotten out. But that didn’t make sense. Our neighbors were widely spaced, and some of them have wandering dogs, sheep and chickens of their own.

So I called him, and he said he wanted to trade me some junk – “but I have good junk!” – for a few hens, if possible. “I have some old knives and things,” he said.

So I told him to come on over and I’d be happy to see if we could trade.

He did, and we got talking about chickens and garden tools and such. He went back to his place around the corner to get a few things and I caught a few hens and we made a trade.

One of the items he had for trade was a fighting cock game hen, along with two mixed Rhode Island Reds. I was interested, because I’ve been working on breeding a better chicken thanks to my new friend Florida Bullfrog.

This is the game hen my neighbor brought over (on the right):

After trading, I emailed Florida Bullfrog some pictures and said:

Old guy just traded me this hen. She is less than a year old, very bright-eyed. He said she is full game, “cause she has them green legs, and that them guys raisin’ game birds don’t like to let their hens go for nuthin, but he got to trade fer one.” You can see her in with a couple of normal domesticated hens. He said “it’s the darndest thing – she makes this weird little sound when a bird fly over, and warns all the other hens. And she’ll fly like an eagle, way up into the trees!” 

I also posted a picture on YouTube, and Bonnie commented:

“Mix Game chicken into any breed for improvement. As for predators, they don’t stand a chance! Husband tells of a Game Hen his mother had… who would fly to the ridge row of their barn when a hawk flew over… and she’d try to fly high enough to engage. One day a hawk obliged her by flying low. Husband says once the feathers cleared that hawk couldn’t move fast enough to get gone!”

We introduced her to the flock last night after dark – hopefully she integrates without issue.

In all, I traded nine of my hens for a Case knife, a fertilizer spreader, an old wheel hoe with a nice potato plow attachment, two Rhode Island Reds that didn’t look pure, that game hen, an antique skinning knife, and a little bitty pocketknife shaped like a peanut.

I’ll post pictures of the wheel hoe soon – it’s a real cool old piece. I am excited about it as well as this hen.

We’ll talk more about that tomorrow. Also, I am back in the office today after spending the end of last week in Blountstown at the Keepers of the Old Ways Survival Expo at the Panhandle Pioneer Settlement. I should have some videos of my talks posted soon. It was a great time.