The Chicken Chaser or Colombian Chicken Rodeo

Just before I left Colombia for the U.S. I had a friend's child take the dogs for a walk. Somehow the dogs got away from her and began to chase a neighbor's chicken. While the dogs were eventually brought back to my fenced yard, apparently the chicken still remained outside the gate, finding many interesting things to eat in the driveway.

The gorgeous black, and very fast, Colombian chicken.

As I was leaving to go to town later that day for either a class or a meal, I came upon this lovely, large, almost black chicken. Having seen it on the next drive over (really should be called a path because it is not paved like a street or driveway in the U.S.) I decided it would behoove me to grab it and return it. While the idea was fleeting, the concept was large and so was the chicken, who was even fleeter of foot than I was.

There might be the possibility of great entertainment to watch grannies as chicken-chasers, because they - the young birds - can certainly cause the Old Birds to pant and risk falling down trying to corner a fowl that has no interest in being caught.

This bird required me to dash back and forth in lateral moves down the sloping path as I first tried to herd it toward its home. Then in a sudden move, intending to possibly frighten the Old Bird, the chicken ran right at me and then did an Olympic leap with flapping feathers right over my head into the brambles, almost out of my reach. Well, technically it was out of my reach, but risking the sharp thorns, I bent down and forced that wily critter up against a rock wall, grabbed its neck and then by distracting it by making cluck, cluck sounds was able to then grab the legs and hoist it out of the maze of twigs, thorns and dead branches noticing that my hands were pretty well sliced up in the bargain.

As I began my walk down the path toward Chicken Casa with the bird upside down in my grip upon its legs, it craned its neck up at me and gave a sort of guttural cluck as if to say, "Now what?" I probably should have lifted it up and cradled it in my arms, but frankly was afraid that if it decided to peck at me I might drop it and hurt it and knew the leg hold was secure until I reached the owner's place. i was mildly embarrassed when the owner (who was very happy to have his fowl friend returned) briefly cradled the clucker, petted her and then put her into the house with the others... his house, not the hen house.

Still breathing a little faster than normal, I headed in the direction of the pueblo, remembering not just the chicken chase, but even back all those eons ago when my father had chickens and I had to deal with an aggressive rooster just to collect the eggs. The sum of my experiences with chickens has not led me to believe I will ever want one of my own.