Years ago we had a friend who was an animal trainer. She received a call from someone wanting to ‘rent’ some chickens and turkeys for a movie shoot. She was a dog person, but knew we had birdies, so she referred that person to us. We ended up ‘renting’ our birds to the movie folks who were filming “The Color Purple” with Oprah Winfrey, just down the road from us at Fairhill, MD. That went on for 8 months.

The set people, for want of a better thing to do in rural Cecil County, started spending time at the farm. At the end of the day, they would bring the chickens back and the set dog, Pup Pup. We had just acquired Kitty George, the sweet corn hog kitty. The set people started teaching him tricks. They said that ‘red’ kitties’ are the best for movie/TV training. If that wasn’t bad enough, they taught the chickens tricks, too. The birds would all come home and walk in a line. They would ‘crow’ on command.

The trainers were feeding them organic veggies. It got so the little feather balls would not eat chicken feed. That was beneath them – so to speak !!!

We received a call from an advertising company to provide some birds for an ad shoot at a Wilmington Delaware headquarters for a world wide credit card company. They paid me and a bunch of ‘helpers’ an outrageous fee to bring our chickens & hang all day to shoot this ‘team training’ program and ultimately, make a TV ad. We were on the job for 10 hours, all over the corporate headquarters… the VP’s and CEO’s office. Let me tell you MY BIRDS DID NOT LET ME DOWN: – THEY DID NOT P****** the entire time. Even when the birds were strutting their stuff over the CEO’s desk (now that was interesting reading) !!! Whoever thought that farming was only on the smart end of a hoe.

Pam