For awhile with Duke Green, I had to take a whacking stick with me anytime I left the front porch. He would sneak up behind me and attack the back of my legs and I would have to turn around and whack him hard enough that I was afraid I really injure him; but he kept coming back for more. Zarah was terribly afraid of him. He would come all the way across the property to try and pick a fight with her. One time I was down on my belly fishing for an egg laid underneath the coop and he rushed at my face and scratched me. He was stew within 36 hours after that.

Rooster Apollo was a Buff Orpington. He was a large golden fellow with a sweet temperament. He never ever ran at us or attacked us or even gave us the hairy eyeball. He looked after the hens and found them treats and crowed quite nicely in the morning.

December 2004 we had a disaster. Some wild dogs or a pack of coyotes hit the property on a bright sunny mid-morning and ate half of our chicken flock, including Apollo the Rooster, who we're sure did his best to fend them off. We were suddenly down to half the number of hens and no rooster at all. We felt very sad and frustrated. Our expected egg production was cut in half and it is hard to come by a rooster as lovely as Apollo was.

Next was Clyde the Black Bar rooster came to us by way of a neighbor's daughter who didn't want anybody to eat him. So we gave him a home for awhile. He seemed to lack both the personality and beauty of previous roosters but he did like to show the hens where a good treat fell on the ground. He stayed awhile and then eventually moved on to the soup pot in favor of another Buff Orpington after the neighbors affection for him waned.

Adonis, another Buff Orpington, reigns over the chicken yard now. He is almost as pretty as Apollo and is farily well behaved.