Identity Crisis?

by Holly Cheel
(Smithville, On. Canada)

You're right about the "brooding capabilities" of the little bantys. (Bantams) I was farm raised and we always had bantys. Their incredible brooding instincts made great foster moms for the eggs of the larger chicken species. I am ashamed to say that as children, we even had one poor hen sitting hopefully on golf balls for weeks before we relented and kidnapped a couple of chicks from another hen for her.
One determined little mother even hatched a goose egg.
In a couple of weeks, the gosling dwarfed the mom, who, nonetheless took her duties very seriously, strolling about with
" her" baby whenever she found a tasty bug or weed seed and hurling herself at various barn cats (who were often minding their own business) and even chasing the tractor on one memorable occasion.
One day we heard the hen shrieking out her alarm call and making a huge fuss. Running over to try to avert whatever the calamity was we found the gosling happily paddling about in the pond, with "mom" frantically calling from the waters' edge, sure that death from drowning was eminent.