Henny Penny Multiplication

There is something to be said for "calling" your animals.  First of all, it's incredibly impressive to visitors when you can "call" and the animal comes running to you.  Secondly, it makes life easier to find a missing animal.

Around here the Wife has chosen to sing to the chickens "Come dear Henny Penny..."  It's unique, and others won't think of it.  The Wife has seventeen of her own personal chickens for eggs.  There are 300+ laying hens around the cows in the fields... those don't hear the "call".  However, we have learned the laying hens in the field are very very social.  When the anyone goes on a walk, the hens in the field tend to get very very excited, and flock around the person.
One day a couple weeks ago, Dear Farmer was looking out the window after dinner and said, "Does it look to you like we have MORE chickens in the yard?"  Whichever child it was he was talking to responded, "Well, I think a few followed us back from our walk today."  That should have been the beginning of Dear Farmer and the Wife "getting a clue", but it wasn't.  Each day someone would go on a walk, and more chickens would appear in the yard.  The pinnacle of this happening, however, was a few days ago when the Wife went on a walk.  The laying hens were very very excited to see a person.  Even though the wife was a good two-hundred feet from the mobile coop, the hens could see her, and they flocked to her!  The Wife doesn't mind chickens, though they aren't her favorite bird...they do give eggs...so she treats them respectfully.  She gave each an affectionate "bop" on the head, and continued her walk...with chickens following her.  Some tired of walking with the Wife, and some diligently hung in there.  Upon the Wife's arrival home, she was being followed by about forty or fifty chickens.  They saw their long lost friends hanging out around the farmhouse and decided they too should stay.  Dear Farmer shrugs his shoulders, "What are you going to do?", he says.  And there isn't anything you can do. Dear Farmer and the Wife have thought about gathering the additional birds at night and driving them back to the mobile coop in the field...but they are just too tired at the end of the day to do it.  So, the Wife calls "Come dear Henny Penny..."  and the wings flap, the feet begin patting on the ground; about sixty birds know it's feeding time down at the barn.  They cluck, they flock, these Henny Penny Chickens are very very happy.