BRINGING THE HERD SOUTH

I awakened this morning amazed that I had slept soundly all night. “I wonder why I slept so well” I inquired of my spouse. “You slept so well because you were tired from bringing the herd south yesterday.”

Yes, we brought the chicken herd from Kansas to Oklahoma I.T. (Indian Territory) and it was not an easy livestock drive.

We drove to Kansas early and had some rain on us but not a lot. We arrived at the old homestead as the sun was shining down and temperatures were rising. I got the wire pens ready and carried them inside the chicken pen. I used a big white sheet to drive all the chickens into the hen house and managed to get them all there except for three.

Ron climbed into the hen house and began handing them out to me one at a time and I began crowding them into the two carriers. Soon the Nelson clan came round the corner crying “Chicken thieves, chicken thieves!” Yes, the chickens made quite a bit of noise during the roundup.

The Nelsons then stood outside the pen and gave us advice from the sidelines. They realized that these 25 chickens were going to be difficult to lift into the trailer since they were going to weigh close to 200 pounds grouped together. Duh! It was a good thing they were there to load them for us.

We managed to catch the three chicken stragglers and all were loaded and ready for the trip. It was a good drive home but it was definitely getting hotter and my chicken-children were getting very warm and breathing heavily.

The pen in Oklahoma needed some finishing touches and they should have been easy but it was hot and we were tired and about the time Ron was finished, it began to storm hard. Thunder, lightening and pouring rain as we were pulling chickens out of the trailer one by one and stuffing them into their new home. It wasn’t funny to us, but observers would have been quite amused at our activities.

The chickens are here and the roosters were crowing loudly this morning. Slim is interested in them. Two tom-cats from Hell have joined us and must be dealt with today. I have celebrated my 60th birthday in grand style with family and friends. My daughter and her family have been here to spend the night in our new, accommodating home and we have traveled 30 short miles to visit in the cabin of good friends.

Life is good and only getting better in I.T.