Bear and Birds

Bear is fascinated by the Victorian Farm series.  He has watched it all the way through and I'm sure I will hear plenty about it.  I've suggested he watches the Wartime Farm next, which is the same people running a farm as they would during WWII as bear is doing WWII as a topic in school.  Bear is more keen to watch the Victorian Pharmacy, again by the same people, where they demonstrate the workings of a nineteenth century pharmacy and some of the remedies that they created.  I'm trying to remember what some of the old remedies contained.  I think I'll encourage bear to keep it to theory only.  It's not that long ago they stopped putting gin in gripe water for babies and they sold arsenic by the pound.

Bear may be fascinated by the Victorian Farm series, but in real life he is not keen on farm animals.  Deep down, he's a city boy.  When he was very little and in a push chair, so perhaps eighteen months, we took him to Temple Newsam Farm.  We pushed him past some hens.  They had all sorts of different varieties, and it included one very assertive cockerel that was about the size of bear at the time who got up close and personal to the fence and crowed as loud as it could at bear through the wire.  Bear didn't cry, but he wasn't keen at all and his look was a very clear, 'get me out of here, mother!'  I think he would agree with you, Jake's Girl, that hens are best left alone.  He also has a healthy respect for geese which also wander at Temple Newsam.  Mind you, anyone with sense stays away from geese.