Could Lucky the hen be any luckier?

HERE is the tale of a solitary chicken called Lucky — alone in her spacious hen house since, one by one, her sisters fell foul of Mr Fox (memo to soppy urbanistas: foxes kill).

One day my husband heard her squawking in terror, raced along — and bold foxy dropped her, severely wounded. She looked near death, but rallied.

Subsequently attacked by a strange dog, she recovered again. Hence her name.

We will get more hens, but until then this chook badly wants friends. So she’s decided to identify as a dog. She follows our three around (bigger than one, and matching the other two) and wanders indoors to drink from their bowls (see below).

There’s often a nasty splat to clean up. And at night she doesn’t want to return to her solitary perch — not when the rest of the ‘flock’ is cosy inside — so my husband is forced out into the dusky dampness to coax her in with fine food. ‘I know Lucks is annoying,’ he says. ‘But I don’t want her to get eaten.’

The other morning he let her out before leaving early. I looked from the bedroom to see her gazing longingly at the kitchen window, where our dogs barked greetings from the window seat. I was feeling sorry for the lonely hen — when I brought myself up sharpish.

More sentimental anthropomorphism. I was assigning that feathery old biddy victim-status when there’s far too much of it around nowadays.

So flip the situation and she’s a strutting moral. Useless because she doesn’t lay eggs, she’d have become tasty coq au vin months ago in rural France. Instead she’s housed, protected, fed, free to wander and finds mates where she can. Every day this creature is a lesson in survival. She’s alive! And therefore Lucky.