Welcome to another issue of Meet the Chickens! Today I’ll be introducing you to Dee Dee, one of our Dominiques. She’s my all time favorite chicken (don’t tell the others) and is quite a character!
Dee Dee has always been our friendliest little lady. When she was a baby, she would run up to me chirping and flapping her wings every time I would visit the brooder box. She would hop up my arm to perch on my shoulder, then peep frantically and loudly into my ear. The rest of the chicks were very clear about the fact that they didn’t care whether I existed or not just as long as I brought them their food, but Dee Dee was special.
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She grew up way too fast, as they all do. Before I knew it, she was an awkward teenager. She was also quite the feisty teenager. Dee Dee was the first of our chickens to reach the top of the pecking order, where she stayed for a few short months before she was knocked down a peg or two by Little Carl.
It was during her teen years that she revealed her adventurous personality, which caused me to chase her over the fence into the neighbors yard on more than one occasion. The little escape artist managed to get out again and again and it wasn’t until I sat on the back porch and watched for 2 hours that I discovered how she was doing it.
Little Miss Smarty Pants was using our wheelbarrow, which was butted up against the fence, as a clever tool to hop over the fence, but then had no idea how to get back over. She would pace frantically back and forth along the fence until her rescue.
Dee Dee was about 4 months old in the photo below.
Here’s a comparison of Dee Dee at one day old and one year old. What a difference a year can make in the life of a chicken! Can you imagine if humans grew this much every year? We’d be ginormous!
Dee Dee is our chatty Kathy. She loves to talk to me whenever I’m outside. The second I open the door I can see her barrelling toward me from the yard, her head down and her wings back, sprinting with her all her might to reach me before any of the other chickens. When she gets to me she’ll look up at me while circling around, ba-gawking like a maniac.
You don’t see too much of Dee Dee in the photos because she’s always stuck to me like glue when I go out to take photos. Most of the photos of her look like this:
Hey! What is that!?
Oh Hi! It’s me! Dee-Dee!
Did you see me!? Hello?! I’m right here!
Look at me! Why are you looking through that thing!?
What’s in there? Hey lady!! Stop looking through that thing and look at ME!!!
Dee Dee also loves to run in front of the camera *right* as I’m about to take a photo, which results in a lovely black and white streak in front of my subject.
Another of her many talents includes ‘helping’ in the garden. Last year when I was trying to plant some new seeds in our raised bed, she was so kind as to follow behind me, digging them back out again and gobbling them up.
Then she was so excited about her finds that she had to go and tell all of her friends, and next thing I knew, I had six chickens digging through my freshly planted garden with Dee Dee in the lead.
She does do some actual helping too, as I’ve employed her several times to gobble down slugs, larvae, and bugs. I also encouraged her help when I dug up our potatoes last year and found what look to be extraterrestrial eggs in our potato box. She was quick to eat every last one of them. I’ll let you know if she starts to glow green in the near future.
Dee Dee is our most friendly bird. She loves to sit on my lap, especially when her feet are really muddy. Every time Dee Dee is sitting on my lap, our Orpington, Frenchie, gets really jealous and comes running over. She’ll stand there, looking from Dee Dee to me and chattering quietly, plotting her next move.
Go away Frenchie! I’ll say.
But no.
Frenchie just circles and putters around the chair until she finds the perfect spot then BAM! She’ll jump directly on top of Dee Dee.
Ba-GAWK! She’ll scream in alarm and go tearing off into the yard. You’d think after all this careful plotting and scheming, Frenchie would hop right in my lap for some attention, but no. She doesn’t want to be with me. She just doesn’t want anyone else to be with me either. She’ll go tear-assing after Dee Dee into the yard for more chicken shenanigans.
She may be filled with chicken shenanigans and drive me up the wall when she sticks to me like a shadow, but I do love this little chicken. Before we got our chickens, I didn’t believe all the warnings about attachment and the power of poultry personality. Now I’m here to warn you. Beware the chickens! You may have intended to turn them into dinner, but they have a way of changing your mind. My friend Dee Dee is here to stay for as long as she likes!
Keep writing Meredith…each chicken can have their own chapter in your future book.
hugs,
Sol
Will do! My own book would be amazing, we’ll see what happens! 🙂
Enjoyed this. Dee Dee has a great personality. Our hens are pretty naughty as well. They also escape into next doors lawn and they go under the fence to do this.
I am very curious about those extraterrestial eggs. What on earth are they?
Is Dee Dee glowing yet?
Best wishes
Grace
Thanks Grace! I have NO idea what those eggs are from, I was hoping by posting them here one of my readers could tell me what they are! She’s not glowing yet, but I’ll keep my eye on her hahah!
Hi there,i think you’ll probably find that Dee Dee was eating snail eggs ! ? : )my chickens will eat them too, with so far no bad side effects-all best-samantha
Ohhh, I think you’re right Samantha!! I just looked up snail eggs on google and they do look like that. I’m glad I’ll have a few less snails in the garden this year! Thanks for your insights~
your welcome : )
Meredith, I adore all your chickens. Your blog is so beautiful, and will provide a lot of inspiration to me as I dream of my own chickens. Thanks for stopping by my blog yesterday; it was a sweet surprise! Keep up the amazing work you do. 🙂