The Pompous Ass

So, Rudy the rooster thinks he is "all that!"...Hmmm, I have another think!

 I raised him from a hatch ling and I know he is just a guy, but if you ask Rudy he will tell you different. After all he is the only guy in Chicken Town, population 45 hens and 11 chicks and 1 Rudy, A.K.A.

 The Pompous Ass!

  The more he struts his stuff around the ladies, the more he thinks of himself. Honestly, I think that he thinks he is French! He wears his comb all tossed to one side like a jaunty French playboy and throws his chin up in the air like it is beneath him to strut near a human. Then there is his temper! He occasionally takes after one of us HUMANS for no reason and lands a good peck and stab of his spike in one slick move. If the unlucky human is not paying attention and can't counter attach with a swift kick then...well let's just say YEEEEOOW! Roosters are powerful and launch their whole bodies into you and then come back for more as soon as they hit the ground again.

 I don't tend to take his abuse and have been known to cuss like a sailor and run around the chicken yard trying to catch him with my foot. This has earned me the proud title of the Fearless Mom from my kids. He is fast though and I don't usually catch him, but this will teach him a lesson and he will avoid us for a few days.
                                    But then without notice he is back "huntin' humans" again!
                   In the past month he has tried to attacked one five year old, one oldest child, one grandma and managed to get one mom leaving a hole in one shin and a bruise the size of a lemon on the other. Needless to say my kids are quite afraid of this rooster, that is all but my middle child A.K.A. The Tough One! She marches past him unconcerned while protecting her siblings who hide behind her as they pass. She will one day inherit my title, I think proudly.

  Well... he made the mistake of going after the middle child the other day, The Tough One.
I hear a scream like someone has been snake bit and my oldest, the Meek child who is scared of the rooster and avoids him at all cost, recognizes the primordial fear and looks at me and says...
                                                                ... "Rudy!"
Another scream and we were off and running with a stick in my hand. I found my toughest child bleeding and crying and Rudy taking aim for another attack (I later find out he attacked 3 times before I got there). I had had enough, I yell at the rooster and Rudy's eyes get big and he runs. I take after him around one side of the hen house and here comes a curious thing around the other side, my oldest child (remember? the Meek!) and she has a stick and is roaring like a lion. Apparently she has had enough as well!

   "YOOOUUU ROOOOSTER! You don't mess with my sisssssstttterrrr!", and off she goes after the wide eyed Rudy. Around and around the hen house we chase him, I going one way, my daughter going the other. I soon relize that Rudy is not running from me at all. Every time I pass her I think "Good Lord, I am glad she's not mad at me!"
Rudy ducks into the hen house and she slams her stick to the hen house door.
"Get out here you little twerp!" she yells, "You don't mess with my sister!", he pops out the opposite side. She is after him again. I run pass the both of them and Rudy looks at me like "Pleeease save meee!"
He slips between the plastic wall and hoops, she swings and the plastic snaps loudly and Rudy cackles and leaps free and she send the stick sailing at him, hits him straight on. Back into the hen house and out the opposite door. She is waiting with stick in hand again, " You think I didn't know you would come out here," she yells and chops the ground a moment after he vacates it.

So, the chase continues for a full ten minutes. Rudy goes right and I am there, Rudy goes left and she is there. Rudy finally dives into a nest box with his head crammed down into the egg slot.
 The oldest child waits at the nest box with her stick swung back like a baseball bat, "Come out you big meany, I'm ready for ya!" she screams at him. I know I have to end this before I have a heart attack from running around the hen house or the oldest catches him. I swing open the egg door and jerk the rooster out...by the way, you have never seen such huge eyes as that rooster...I grab his neck and ...

"DON'T YOU EVER TOUCH HER SISTER AGAIN RUDY!" I scream at him...
... and throw him on the ground.
    Rudy squawks and flutters away to hide in a bush. I look back at my oldest, she still clinches her stick with white knuckles and anger pressing her lips to a straight line. She looks at me as if disappointed that I have spared him. She marches pass me and I think "Oh crap! She is going after him again," but she marches over to her little sister, who still cries by the fence. Oldest child throws the stick down and scoops her sister into arms and hugs her about in two.

 I am awestruck, it is like watching a movie when the war stained soldier comes back from defending the village single handed and scoops up the frighten child to assure them that all the enemies have been defeated.
"Don't you worry, that rooster won't mess with you again," she says softly to her.

 I stand there gasping , looking from the kids to a bush in the corner where the former Pompous Ass now whimpers pathetically and try to get my head around this sudden shift in power. Perhaps Rudy will not be Pompous Ass of Chicken Town for awhile, perhaps the Toughest child has just been shifted to the Protected and the Meekest will now inherit the title Fearless. As for me, I think I have lost all titles and should take up jogging again to prepare for the next round with Rudy.