Chasing Chickens (Stories From In2Ed Africa Book 11)

Chasing Chickens

Eric is proud of his 10 hens, but when each one appears with a fluffy yellow chick, his small flock suddenly becomes much harder to manage. With 20 chickens to care for, Eric and his friends must work together to find a solution.

When the children start selling eggs at the market, it seems like they have solved one problem — until a new one appears. While everyone is arguing about what to buy, the chickens escape. Now Eric and his friends must search everywhere before night falls.

A warm and engaging early reader, Chasing Chickens is a story about responsibility, teamwork and friendship, with a gentle sense of humour and a reassuring ending young readers will enjoy.

Find out what happens when Eric’s chickens get loose in Chasing Chickens.

Excerpt from the book

Eric had 10 brown chickens. They were very fine chickens and Eric was proud of them.

“I have the best looking chickens in town” Eric said. “And they are easy to count.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. 9, 10.”

But one morning, Eric’s chickens did not come out of their house.

“Are they ill?” asked Maya.

“Maybe they’re tired” said Julius.

Eric didn’t know. He tried to tempt them out with delicious corn. He tried to get them out by calling and singing to them.

But still the chickens didn’t move. For 3 weeks the chickens sat on their nests.

Then one morning, Eric, Maya, Wanjira and Julius got a big surprise. The chickens were finally out of the house and were walking around the yard. And following each chicken was a new, fluffy, yellow chick!

“So that’s why they weren’t moving” laughed Wanjira. “They were hatching chicks!”

“Cheep, cheep, cheep” said the chicks.

“Now there are so many chickens” Eric said. “I don’t have enough money to look after them all”.

“And what if the chickens have more chicks?” asked Maya. “Then you will have too many chickens to count.”

“You will need to buy more bags of corn” said Wanjira.

“And lots more hay” said Julius.

Eric was worried. How would he find the money he needed?

“You could sell the chicks” suggested Maya. But Eric didn’t want to do that. He loved his chicks.

“You could train them to do tricks and make people pay to watch” said Julius. But Eric thought that was silly.

“Why don’t you sell the eggs that they lay?” Wanjira said. “You could take the eggs to market”.

Eric liked this idea. “But I don’t know anything about selling eggs” he sighed.

“We’ll help you” smiled Maya. “I think this is an excellent idea.”

“No, it’s an EGGcellent idea” said Julius. And everyone laughed.

The children were busy. Wanjira said it was important to know how many eggs each chicken was laying.

“We’ve had 10 eggs from this brown one” said Eric proudly.

“But only 2 eggs from that white one” grumbled Julius. “She’s a lazy one”. The white chicken came along and pecked Julius’ foot. “Ouch!” he cried.

The others laughed. “Maybe she heard what you were saying” grinned Maya. “She’s telling you off!”

Soon the children had a lot of eggs to sell. Mama gave them paper bags to put the eggs in.

They decided to sell the eggs for 20 shillings each. Mama said this was more expensive than other eggs, but Eric said these eggs came from very special chickens, so it was agreed.

The next Saturday, the children woke up early. They put the eggs carefully onto a cart and waved goodbye to Mama.

When they got to the market, they set up their egg stall. Lots of people came and bought eggs. By the end of the day, there were only 4 eggs left.

“What shall we do with these eggs?” Maya asked.

“That’s easy” laughed Julius. “There are 4 eggs and 4 children. We’ll have one each for supper!”