At nineteen, I thought it would be a brilliant life choice to become a hen mother to twelve chicks. Chicks that would eventually grow into noisy, egg-laying, escape artists.
This little one, whose name would later become Red, is a Rhode Island Red who faithfully laid an egg every day of the week. She was by-far the nicest, calmest, coolest chicken of my whole flock/fleet, and would be one of the longest-surviving members of this urban unit.
If you've had chickens, I'd love to have you weigh in: were your chickens extremely hierarchic and militaristic? My birds were serious creatures, who respected boundaries of one another but would tear up anything that gave them weird vibes. They had a particular order of feeding, laying, and picks of fallen prey. And, if one chicken were attacked by a predator, they would group together to collective destroy the assailant.
As cute as they were, most were insane and territorial and uncaring of me, except when I was late to feed them.
Red, on the otherhand, didn't mind wearing a harness and leash, taking strolls down the road and accepting pets from the neighborhood kids.
In this photo, she is perched atop a very crappy car that I was photographing for Craigslist sale.
Almost every sale photo features Red in a small corner, sitting on a seat, or in some way hiding in the shot. I had 27 people call me within the first couple hours, simply because they were curious about the chicken.
How I wish I still had those car photos! I'll keep hunting for them and share if I find them.
That's the story behind the shot!
shot on a nikon d3100 + 50mm f/1.8 lens.
Hi, I'm Amelia! It's nice to meet you.
I'm a writer, minimalist, tiny home dweller, and maker living in East Tennessee, USA. You might have found me through the Ladies of Steemit curation initiative, showcasing the female voices on the Steemit platform. Let's hang out on the blockchain and see where it takes us.

