Winning letter
My adopted feathered children
I grew up in Ladybrand in the Eastern Free State. Your article “Weird best friends: chickens rule, okay?” in the Autumn 2021 issue took me way back.
When I was a child, our family could never go away together during the December holidays. My father was the director of the children’s home in Ladybrand, where supervision was needed at all times. The home was on the outskirts of the town and was run like a farm, with cows, a vegetable garden, orchards and a large open veld.
Every December, a few children who were not placed for the holidays would remain at the home. During one such break I discovered a nest on which a guinea fowl hen was brooding. A few days later I heard that a few of the boys from the children’s home had shot a guinea fowl. I returned to the nest right away and found 12 orphaned and bewildered chicks. I carried them home and begged Mom and Dad to let me keep and raise them.
In the evenings I placed them in a box that stood next to the Aga coal stove in the home’s large kitchen. The stove was kept
