Let me introduce you to Hennifer Lopez. No, not Jennifer the singer—although this one does have a set of pipes on her. Hennifer is one of my hens, but calling her just a “chicken” feels like an insult to her enormous sense of self-importance. She’s the kind of bird who thinks rules are for other chickens.
For reasons known only to Hennifer, and possibly the chicken underworld, she has declared war on the nest boxes. You know, those cozy, private, purpose-built little spaces where every other hen happily deposits her egg. Not Hennifer. No, she prefers the corner of the coop, jammed in behind whatever obstacle I foolishly thought would deter her.
At first, it was simple. She picked a corner to lay her egg, and refused to budge. I thought I could outsmart her (spoiler alert: I couldn’t). I blocked off her chosen corner with a heavy box, stuffed full of odds and ends to make it heavy enough that she couldn’t move it. That lasted about an hour.
When I came back to check on her, I found that Hennifer had worked that box like a champion furniture mover. She’d pushed, scratched, and wiggled it inch by inch until she managed to wedge her feathery body behind it. There she sat, smug as can be, proudly laying her egg like she’d just won the gold medal at an Olympic event.
Round two: I got serious. I took a tall, heavy piece of wood and screwed it diagonally across the corner—too high to jump, too solid to move. Ha! Take that, I thought. Corner closed.
But Hennifer? She simply shrugged metaphorically and moved to the another corner. Problem solved… for her.
Meanwhile, I stood there, staring at the actual nest box. It’s not like I cheaped out—plenty of straw, cozy, private, shaded, with just enough room for a chicken to settle in and lay in peace. Honestly, if I were a chicken, I’d pick it myself. But apparently, I don’t have the discerning taste of Miss Lopez.
Then came this morning. I heard the unmistakable sound of Hennifer’s egg song. If you’ve never heard a hen announce her egg-laying plans to the entire world, think of it as a cross between a foghorn and someone yelling "LOOK AT ME!" on repeat. She strutted over to her new chosen corner and started scratching, determined to redecorate yet another area of my coop.
Not today, Hennifer.
I scooped her up—feathers fluffed, protests shrieked—and deposited her in the nest box. To make sure she couldn’t pull her usual Houdini routine, I slid a board across the entrance. Essentially, chicken jail. Temporary confinement for egg-laying purposes. She could look out, but not get out.
What followed can only be described as a temper tantrum of epic proportions.
She spun circles like a wind-up toy, screaming her outrage at the top of her lungs. She shoved at the board like she thought she could shoulder it aside, battering at it like a SWAT team in full riot gear. Honestly, if tiny tactical vests existed for chickens, she’d have strapped one on and grabbed a miniature battering ram. I half-expected her to yell, “BREACH! BREACH!” as she slammed into the barrier, convinced that sheer willpower and poultry rage would break her out. And when I reached in to check on her progress, she lunged and bit me. Not pecked. Bit. If chickens had fingers, I know exactly which one she would have shown me.
But eventually, nature did what nature does. After all that noise and fury, she did lay her egg. When I finally removed the board, expecting her to bolt out in a huff and resume her diva strut, she didn’t. She just fluffed her feathers and looked at me like, “Nope. I live here now.”
Suddenly, as if she hadn’t just staged a full-blown protest, she decided the nest box was… comfortable. Too comfortable, in fact. Yes, she refused to leave. She just sat there, cozy as can be. I stood there thinking: seriously? I had to lift her out and set her down in the middle of the coop.
And then? The biggest twist of all: the hen who’s never been particularly friendly, the one who made it clear humans were simply an unfortunate inconvenience in her world, started following me. She perched near me, soft-clucking, actually asking to be picked up. After weeks of treating me like hired help, she suddenly acted like we were best friends. I had to carry her around like some spoiled lapdog,
When I last checked on her, what was Hennifer Lopez doing? Hopping in and out of the very nest box she had previously treated like a medieval torture device. Scratching around, clucking happily, acting like a teenager who’d just discovered Instagram.
Chickens make no sense. Hennifer Lopez makes even less sense. So, here I am—outsmarted once again by a chicken with a brain roughly the size of a walnut. And not even a good walnut… one of those shriveled-up ones you only find when you’re desperate enough to finish the bag.
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