Product Description

Owning chickens is becoming the latest in metropolitan chic, proving that you don't need to be a farmer to raise poultry. This book chronicles both the pleasures and the myriad pitfalls of chicken-keeping. Written from first-hand experience, this is a quirky introduction to the feather-clad soap opera primal urges, pecking order rituals, gender-bending and huge vet bills.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #20147 in Books
• Published on: 2003-09-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 160 pages

Review
For Martin Gurdon chickens have featured throughout his life - albeit intermittently. Entranced as a child, captivated by chicks of another variety during adolescence before finally returning to his first, feathered love when leaving London for the country. With his dry wit, perfect pitch of pride and paternalism, his timely sense of humour and eye for the wry, he will entertain you with his chicken tales till you are all cried out and curled in a ball on the floor from laughter. From Mike the Headless Chicken of Colorado who survived a botched decapitation for an obscenely long amount of time and whose life is still celebrated today in annual festivals across the state, to the highly-strung Yvette, doyenne of the baby bouncer before turning into a doyen.. The bullied Gerald and the psychotic BB and a whole host of others, for all Martin's hens are named and obviously loved despite their many shortcomings. Huge vet bills are paid without complaint in an attempt to heal them while physiotherapy and psychotherapy are all par for the course. But above all, they become almost human in Martin's literary hands and the agony and anguish of their perils is lived to the full. A must for chicken lovers and a must for anyone with a wicked sense of humour - this is the funniest book I have read all year. - Lucy Watson

From the Author
I wrote most of 'Hen, etc,' on the train between Headcorn in Kent and Charing Cross Station in London. A lot of my fellow passengers were reading chick lit novels, and I wanted to write one too, but being a decrepit, male motoring journalist, could see there might be a credibility gap if I tried to do something on the lives and loves of bright young things in Clapham.
My wife and I kept a few hens. Their birdy activities made our friends laugh, so writing about them seemed the natural thing to do. The end product is as much about the characters of the birds themselves, and how they interacted with us, as it is about actually keeping chickens.
The book was a lot of fun to write, and hopefully that comes across. Given where it was written, I'd always envisaged Hen as being a diverting read that could be dipped in to on a long train journey, a holiday or an idle weekend. If it works on that level, and tells the reader how to avoid red mite, then I'll be a very happy hack.

Customer Reviews

A few lessons and a lot of chicken drama.
When we first got our little flock of half a dozen, one hen was most notably bullied by the others. We had a couple of books from the library most of which were bogged down in pests and diseases or graphic black line drawings on killing them. How I wish we had this book. It is easily read and glows with a love of chickens and their personalities as well as how to look after your birds. Chickens are underestimated and much more interesting and easier to keep than imprisoning an unfortunate exotic pet in your home. On the subject of a £50 vets bill for a hen that cost £3.50, Gurdon explains "Perhaps this is a waste of money ....but this galumphing, primitive animal with 8,000 feathers has easily given us more entertainment value than we'd have got from spending £50 on cigarettes, lifestyle magazines or some rubbish TV programmes ......She's enjoyed life and we've enjoyed her enjoying it. What more could any of us want?" A bit of compassion and a great laugh, what indeed else could we want?

Hen and the art of chicken maintenance
This was a really funny book, it had me laughing out loud all the way through but you would have to keep hens for it to be really relevant. A good read and I picked up a few bits of good adviceand felt I had learnt a little about chickens but not an information book.

Eggcellent
My only criticsm of this book was that it was too short. It is an entertaining tale of keeping chickens, don't expect to learn to much from it for that I'd reccomend Storey's Guide to Raising Chickens but for those still wonderimg about weather to get chickens or not this will make your mind up.