Once upon a time a flock of nearly 50 peafowl ranged the fields of Gerolstein. I was reduced to eating their eggs every year to stop a populations explosion. But they got wise, and hid said eggs in unlikely places ... so we called in Nigel the peacock catcher & exporter and finally reduced the flock to (1) Paterfamilas (2) two of his lusty male descendants (3) two hens. Right? No. Some neighbouring (!) hens heard the cries of the marauding males and moved in! And everyone cried out some more, Paterfamilas was cowed and the hens laid a double crop. Call for Nigel! Cut off the problem, so to say, at its root.
The lusty lads were ensnared and exported, and Paterfamilas left alone at the head of his wee harem. The five of them perch in a line on the rail of my wheelchair ramp, peacefully and companionably pecking the nits out of one another's eyes ...
Is this the aged Pascha, impotent after years of extravagance, luxuriating in his older years, attended by his sisters, cousins, aunts, daughters, grand-grand-daughters ..? Or will he be having a cockerel of a time come next breeding season? We'll see ..
Meanwhile, the ladies of the harem are cultivating their suntans while Mr P looks benignly on ...
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