I has a stick
I bought a very crooked walking stick at a church fete this Summer. It is a chicken herding stick. It is for herding chickens who are not safe in the presence of my hands.
Albert. I’m talking about Albert.
I gently guide him around with the thick end when I need him to go somewhere. Albert has come to hate the chicken stick with intensity and goes out of his way to kick and peck at it.
Maybe that’s because I push him around with it. But looking at it this evening in the umbrella stand, I believe it’s because it looks like a snake.
Gosh, my camera phone is getting crappier, isn’t it?
Posted: September 27th, 2021 under personal.
Comments: 9
Comments
Comment from Skandia Recluse
Time: September 27, 2021, 8:07 pm
There was a chicken lady, who had a crooked stick.
She herded crooked chickens along a crooked wick,
and found a crooked sixpence upon a crooked pick.
She had a crooked cat, which caught a crooked mouse,
and they all lived together in a crooked chicken house.
(Don’t hate me, I was abused as a child. It is not my fault.)
Comment from Drew458
Time: September 27, 2021, 9:34 pm
Is it the male/female trans-species thing? Does your cockerel Albert become obedient for Uncle Badger? Just wondering. I’ve seen this with some farm animals before. They’ll fight back against a female human telling them what to do, but a male – many times larger than they are, or at least one in command – will get them to behave. Farm animals are so sexist. This works for our house cats too, our little girls. They nibble on Mommy and don’t behave, but Daddy’s word is law.
Comment from durnedyankee
Time: September 27, 2021, 10:01 pm
obedient animals.
Wouldn’t know, I’m somewhere below the omega in the pack.
Comment from Some Vegetable
Time: September 27, 2021, 10:03 pm
Drew – the male-dominance thing certainly seems true in our house… as applies to cats anyhow. Our 22 pound (yes) cat bullies my wife but never me. He actually listens to me when I tell him to get off the furniture. This law only applies in my immediate presence but when I walk into the room he gets up and moves.
Comment from Mark Matis
Time: September 27, 2021, 10:21 pm
Bet that would work better with a snake tongue added!!!
Comment from Surly Ermine
Time: September 28, 2021, 2:06 am
I’ve made some from Bradford pear which grows slow and ours at home are good and knobby. Osage orange is another favorite. It makes an ugly stick and man is it tough. Dad would clamp his sticks in a piece of angle iron to straighten them out but I like ‘em crooked myself.
Comment from durnedyankee
Time: September 28, 2021, 9:25 am
Turns out that Crepe Myrtle is also a good one to use for walking sticks and canes.
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: September 28, 2021, 3:25 pm
I’ve considered tying a red bandanna around the top. Chickens are very obsessive about the color red.
Comment from BJM
Time: September 29, 2021, 7:18 pm
*Sneer* You call that a snake stick?
This is a snake stick! Snakes figure large in the Aboriginal Creation story. When a snake-shaped stick is happened upon it is decorated to look like a snake as a talisman.
I have three that represent a brown snake, a tiger snake and a Gwardar. Scares the hella out of cats and dogs at first sight.
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