Where did the phrase “Mother Hen” come from?

You got me. Where? I can tell you it didn’t originate from our chicken coop.

For today’s class, I must bow my head in embarrassment and say that I did not do my homework. And because of this, we had a very grim day on our little plot of 5 acres yesterday.

I had no intention of another chicken post today, but I have to share what we learned while the lesson is still fresh in my head. What I didn’t mention yesterday when talking about our 11 egg-laying hens is that we also have 2 week-old Cornish Cross chicks. These chickens are bred for meat instead of eggs, which means that they will only exist until the first weekend of November.

Since they are bred for meat, they grow Fast and the 32 little balls of fluff outgrew their brooder. After much thought, Mr. boarded up the bottom row of nest boxes so that the baby chicks couldn’t interrupt the hens. This allowed them free run of the coop, but still gave them access to their heat lamps and chick starter food. On Thursday evening Mr. let the baby chicks out and checked several times through the evening and first thing yesterday morning and all was well.

I took my afternoon stroll to the coop to check for eggs and to peek at the little balls of fluff and I was met with a very grim discovery. The hens killed 7 of our baby chicks. They pecked them to death. So while I’m now very unsure where the term “mother hen” came from, I now understand the phrase “hen pecked.”

OMG!?!? I was in pure shock. The remaining chicks were huddled into two different groups – one in the brooder, one freezing outside the brooder; but both trying to protect themselves from the hens who were still lurking about. They were scared to death and even though living, they all have battle scars. As of this morning, we have not lost any additional chicks, but only time will tell how many of the remaining will survive.

First chance I had last night, I hit the internet and searched for this very topic. I learned that you cannot put chickens together until they are approximately the same size and even at that time, you should watch closely to make sure everyone is getting along. I also learned that hens can turn on their own baby chicks and attack them.

I never in my wildest dreams would have imagined the sheer morbidity of what I saw yesterday afternoon. Another lesson learned and countless more to go.

As for the hens, they are very glad that I discovered what they had done instead of Mr. While I was unbelievably upset about the situation, Mr. has a much bigger temper than I have and he admitted that had he discovered it, we may have had chicken soup for dinner last night instead of grilled cheese and tomato soup.