Rusty Pinklegs

He was by far the most troublesome and charming manchicken! I couldn't keep my eyes off him, he was so uncommonly handsome and had just "that way" of looking at you from under his jaunty comb. And he was a big problem.

Before the kids came, John & I had enjoyed casually hanging out with and occasionally serving lunch to the local chickens on the outskirts of the yard but in the case of Rusty, our nurturing turned out to be a big mistake, I blame it all on love, animal love.

In spite of being reared by a foreign, non-species family and spoiled rotten…and…having delicate pastel pink legs, Rusty grew up big and strong with a heroic rooster ethic that instinctively drove him to claim the space under the house (right below our place of rest) as his domain. I was all in favor of this territorial acquisition as I thought "the kids" would be safer and started feeding them there so they wouldn't have to risk the dangers of the jungle and those vicious, nasty mongoose to find food. He, Sista Sola and Irving became inseparable in their sanctuary.
But once Rusty started crowing, "RRRRR" things changed. As he found his voice and his confidence grew, he added more syllables, "this is mine, this is all mine" and insisted on broadcasting right under the house below our bed. John regarded this with disfavor but temporarily indulged my maternal reasoning and was mildly tolerant.

So enamored with him, and protective, I would actually leave the bed, before my time, before my coffee! before he started his morning braggadocio, to get his peanut can and coax him for a walk down the road in an attempt keep silence until the menfolk awakened. He'd follow me anywhere for what was in that peanut can, he craved seeds and was accustomed to having his meals paid for. I think he understood that I would not allow any act of aggression toward him and he felt safe under the aegis of my devotion.
As with all pampered pets, his higher instincts began to degenerate and his base instincts started taking over. He became so cocky that he started inviting the other hens in from the yard for crumbs and other fowl fun. Older women who really belonged to Henry. He became a debauched party boy. Irving hung on for a while but Rusty eventually drove him off. And sadly Sola just disappeared.

The place became a political catastrophe. Gimpy, the old lame cockadoodler started challenging him with bloodcurdling objections to Rusty's feathered arrogance. Henry, the gruff, one-eyed dominant patriarch of the outer yard, and keeper of most of the hens became so peeved he would just march into Rusty's den of iniquity and conduct a strident "crow off" in an attempt to reclaim his girls and take Rusty's confidence down. It didn't work, they'd reluctantly return to him but the minute he wasn't paying attention, they'd sneak under the house for more fun with the young and virile Rusty. Juantu, Rambo and Guido, young cockerels, admired his reproductive virtuosity, and were eager to get in on it. They cheered him on vociferously from the sidelines like chicken spectators at a Roman orgy. The din was outrageous, it was a cacophony of deafening proportions! Rusty needed to be dealt with.

Well, as you might imagine, this exacerbated the situation with the man I sleep with (or rather, sleep next to, he wasn't sleeping) and the man's immediate descendant, both of whom had various "ultimate solutions" for Mr. Pinklegs. They advised me to let go, Rusty was old enough to take care of himself, not a chick anymore, etc., and they reminded me that they were both very good shots. A rift was growing between us as Rusty Rooster was stealing my affections and loyalty and I was desperate.

I hated being a cheat but I passionately loved him, I was abjectly possessive, he was MY rooster, he had PINK LEGS! But I couldn't go on much longer during dinner pretending, "A noise, what kind of noise? I didn't hear anything".

In a disingenuous attempt at a diversion, I even convinced John it was all Gimpy's fault. So one afternoon we packed him off into the forest where we hike. Oh! did he give me a toxic look as he hobbled off into the deep jungle after being released from his rubber band leg irons and liberated from John's backpack. I felt like a skunk, but I still had Rusty! It kept on, getting more and more complex and out of control. Eventually I was forced to admit we (er,…I) had a serious problem. I knew there would be a war and I was in the middle of a poultry love triangle.