A question of sexing

So this morning I wake up rather early, but nowhere near as early as CSB, who is already in the kitchen listening to the morning news.
I greet him and ask if he wants to hear my dream.
He does not.
I have some bad news, he says. O dear, I think, what else could the pope do?
What? I ask.
I heard some noises in the chicken coop earlier.
Oh no, I say.
We have a rooster.
A rooster! Is that all? I thought a fox had gotten into the henhouse last night.
It must one of the new ones, but it’s unmistakably crowing.
I guess chicken sexing is not a perfect science, I say.

Later today I spend some quality time in the henhouse trying to discover and photograph the rooster in question.This is the result and no, he/she did not make any effort to stand still for the camera.
Last fall we got 24 new pullets, Rhode Island Reds, Buff Orpingtons and Ameraucanas. When you get that many chickens McMurray’s throws in a bonus exotic breed, also, presumably, a pullet. The sad news, on top of the bad news, is that it appears that the rooster and the exotic bird are one and the same. I don’t know exactly what kind he/she is, but – except for that white patch on the wattle – he looks like a Welsummer. Rather handsome too, I think.

This is a certified Welsummer rooster, from the Internet.

From chicks back to the Basement Books (#77)

Chances are you want to hear how we are faring with the all-important task of sexing the chickens. It seems we have missed the opportunity to insert our fingers into the cloaca to feel the tell-tale penis-like bump – this can only be done safely in the first 24 hours of a chicken’s life, and I am happy to report that they are MUCH older now. So we are back to secondary sexual characteristics. And since chickens do not replace toilet paper rolls on dispensers, or fail to, nor do they talk about their feelings, or refuse to, these sure-fire indicators are not available to us. This morning I was looking for subtle signs of a desire to crow, or lay an egg. Last night they all gathered together under the heat lamp and slept in a sweet roosting-like cluster. Or so I want to believe. In Raising Chickens for Dummies, we read that the combs and wattles of the roosters will grow faster and larger than the hens; also, the roosters will have pointed – not rounded – hackle feathers. And we feel confident that the chicks will agreeably stay very still while he examine their body parts.

Since there is nothing to report, chicken-sex-wise, I thought I would discuss one of the more exciting Books from the Parental Basement. That would be Isometrics, by Henry Wittenberg, Olympic Gold Medal Champion. Our first introduction to isometrics was in Bill Bryson’s The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid, in which the young Bill is observing his father practicing isometric exercises, which look a lot like someone standing still or sitting still. In Bryson’s capable hands, this is weepingly funny, or it is when read aloud by CSB in the tropics. So when I found a guide to isometrics in the basement, by an isometric champion no less, I could not wait to share it with CSB.
One cool thing about isometrics is that you can do them in 10-second increments. Here’s an example: press your right hand against the right side of your head and push while your head pushes back. Voila – you have created tension without motion, and you can call it exercise. Although it says clearly on the cover of this 5th GIANT PRINTING that Wittenberg is an Olympic champion, it turns out he is not the Olympic Isometric champion (I still don’t know who that is), and that was disappointing. He was a wrestler.

If you were a promoter of an “Amazing System of No-Motion Exercises” and writer of a best-selling guide to the Magic of Isometrics, you would think this might get mentioned in your obituary. I would. So I found it very strange when last month I read of the death of Henry Wittenberg at age 91, and isometrics were nowhere mentioned. (Do isometrics get any credit for his remarkable longevity? No, they do not.) His early fondness for chess and swimming was alluded to. His career as a champion wrestler was highlighted. His participation in the Maccabiah Game was featured. We read how, unable to secure a job as a teacher, he became a police officer. He is quoted on the subject of weight lifting as a training regiment.
Nothing about Isometrics.

The Chicks are here

As if it were not chaotic enough around here, what with the Gypsy lute-makers camping in the attic, and our mattress in the living room (While we painted our bedroom “rouge” with “desert tan” trim) along with the pillows and blankets and CSB’s tuxedo, and stacks of honey supers everywhere you turn, and bowls full of precious gourd seeds in the kitchen, and the imported Bolivian moths laying their Andean moth eggs in my sock drawer, and the Maine junior lacrosse team practicing in the front yard, the chickens moved in today.
Fifteen of them.
Because they are so small they all fifteen are residing in a large wooden crib (See above) filled with soft pine shavings, and we are hoping very much that the dogs do not think of them as a meal.
They will move into the chicken coop soon (it’s not quite ready; CSB is installing the chandelier and I’ll be hanging the damask curtains later tonight) but we’re not exactly sure when – we will have to consult with Raising Chickens for Dummies.
If we had gone about this in a somewhat normal fashion, we would have ordered day old chicks from McMurray’s Hatchery and they would have sent us hens. But instead, the little boys who formerly lived next door and now live in the next town, wanted to hatch the chicks from eggs. So our friend Annie Farrell gave CSB 24 eggs of various colors and breeds, and the boys hatched them in an incubator behind the sofa in their octagonal TV room. Fifteen eggs hatched and so far all fifteen are still alive and chirping. But we have no idea whether we have hens or roosters. And this is a very important distinction. Hens lay eggs. Roosters crow at early hours, and annoy the neighbors and in fact roosters are aves non grata in our town.

At least once a day we have some sort of discussion about chicken sexing. Chicken sexing is quite an art. (I did a lot of research on this subject for Absent A Miracle, believe it or not. Most of it did not make it into the novel.) It involves inserting a finger into the chicken’s rectum and feeling for a tell-tale bump. If you’re unwilling to do this – and I am unwilling – then you have to wait for the appearance of their secondary sexual characteristics.

So far the only specific breed identified is the Crevecour. The boys named her/him Bump, because of her/his flashy upright hairstyle. She looks like a punk Restoration playwright to me.
CSB is not going to refer to any of the chickens by name, for the obvious reason. I think he will be outnumbered.