Winifred & Number 47

Winifred Goose & her best buddy rooster, out for an afternoon stroll through the woods. The rooster is one of a half-dozen look-alikes that hatched out year before last. He was destined for the soup pot until Winifred picked him as her best friend forever. She followed him around, honking, nagging, persisting . . . she was the worst kind of stalker. At first, the rooster seemed pretty freaked out. She beat up a few big bully roosters for him, though, and he decided she wasn't so bad to have around.

And then one day it happened. We planned a batch of chicken & noodles. We waited for nightfall when all the roosters to. . . well . . . go to their roosts. They're easier to catch then. We picked a meaty-looking one and stuck it in a cage so it would still be around come morning when there was enough light to . . . um . . . dispatch it. Well, come morning, there was a terrible racket in the barn. Winifred wouldn't shut up, and that got the other geese going, which got the guineas started and upset every other thing on the place. I hurried out to the barn and found Winifred, circling Number 47's cage and pitching a fit. I just couldn't stand to break her heart, so I put a leg band on him so we'd always know which rooster belongs to Winifred. He's now known as Number 47, aka Winifred's Special Friend.

Oh, and we had hamburgers for dinner. Shhhh. Don't tell the cattle.