Ember's Egg

Photo copyright Aji, 2015; all rights reserved.

I mean, is that not the perfect egg? Seriously. Look at it from another angle: 

Photo copyright Aji, 2015; all rights reserved.

I mean.

It's the Beyoncé of eggs: Flawless.

It only took her a week to lay it.

Actually, as of a few days ago, I wouldn't have bet on her being with us, much less laying the perfect egg. It was bound so thoroughly that it seems to have impinged on nerves, perhaps permanently. It began with her right leg and foot, which is why I didn't recognize it for what it was for a few days: Knowing how they trample all over each other to get out, or to get at food, I thought she'd just gotten stepped on. She wasn't showing any of the usual signs of being egg-bound. 

That all changed last Friday. Yes, the same day as the fire. During the hours I was waiting for Wings to return with the proper kind of electrical cord, I was completely without anything to do that required electricity, because, y'know, we had none. An electrical fire will do that.

It was too hot to stay inside, and by late that morning, it was obvious what was wrong with Ember anyway. I spent a good share of the day massaging her abdomen, trying to move the egg (which, at that point, seems to have been the yolk only), and otherwise taking care of her.

Nothing.

Saturday. Nothing.

Sunday. Nothing.

Monday. Nothing.

The good news was that she seemed engaged. She was perfectly willing to stagger around, in the coop or out, hopping drunkenly, scooting herself along the ground by using her wings as feathery propellers. Or maybe oars. Or crutches.

By Sunday or so, the limp had shifted sides; her right foot supported her fine, but the left no longer did. Still, she wanted to hop around and drink water and especially eat, and she'd scramble for food right in the middle of the scrum with the other ten chickens.

This morning when I went outside, she was under the ramp leading up the doorway of the coop, and wouldn't come out for me. It didn't seem like a good sign. After all this time, most chickens would normally have been septic. Scratch that; they would normally have been septic days ago. By today, most chickens would already have been gone.

I went out again a half-hour or so later to check on her, and she'd moved up into one of the nests inside the coop, trying once again to lay. I checked; nothing. All of the other chickens were running around outside.

Five minutes later, I heard triumphant squawking. I ran out to see, but to my disappointment, it was one of the reds, having just laid an egg in one of the many nests they've built among the bales in the hay barn.

I decided to check on her anyway.

She saw me coming and stood up, lifting her feathery skirts to show me what lay underneath.

That perfect brown egg. Not a bit of anything on it, no malformation, no cracks, no wrinkles, no spots. Those photos up there? Unwashed. Just as it was laid.

Just a perfect brown egg.

And Ember is still limping, but she's running around with the rest now, tailfeathers fully up again.

Sometimes, you get a miracle.

All content, including photos and text, are copyright Aji, 2015; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.