Unusual Chickens for the Exceptional Poultry Farmer: List 3

by Kelly Jones
When twelve-year-old Sophie Brown moves from a California city to a farm her dad has inherited, she is determined to learn how to raise the chickens she finds.

This list covers pages 122–212 of the 2016 Yearling edition.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: List 1, List 2, List 3
25 words 24 learners

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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. stubborn
    refusing to change one's mind or ways; difficult to convince
    “Mom wouldn’t let me open it,” he said.
    “Well, she has to have water, at least,” I said stubbornly.
  2. brood
    be in a huff and display one's displeasure
    Very docile. Will often go broody; excellent for raising chicks from fertile eggs.
  3. account
    the grounds or reason for
    And you have to keep them inside all winter, or they get too wet and cold, even in California, on account of them not having proper feathers.
  4. harvest
    gather, as of natural products
    Chris says you can grow sunflowers from sunflower seeds, and then you can save the seeds from
 the sunflowers for your chickens! So you plant one seed, and harvest a whole bunch!
  5. occur
    come to one's mind
    “But it never occurred to me to learn how!” she said.
  6. funky
    (of music) having the soulful feeling of early blues
    And then Dad remembered this really funny song called “The Funky Chicken” and taught me and Mom how to do the dance.
  7. stale
    lacking freshness, palatability, or showing deterioration
    It’s okay if they’re a little stale. You could even cut up your leftover tortillas after you have tacos or quesadillas and put them in the freezer to save for migas, if you were organized.
  8. grate
    reduce to shreds by rubbing against a perforated surface
    Other good stuff you might have around, like grated cheese or chopped tomatoes or sliced olives or cut-up avocado
  9. shifty
    characterized by insincerity or deceit; evasive
    Chris looked kind of shifty-eyed then.
  10. anxious
    causing or fraught with or showing nervousness
    I looked at the sky, feeling all sorts of wriggling anxious thoughts, but even I knew it was getting too dark to go tonight.
  11. sociable
    inclined to or conducive to companionship with others
    Chatty and sociable; will often follow farmers around.
  12. spoke
    a rod joining the hub of a wheel to the rim
    I was looking to see how I could hitch the wagon to my bike without the handle getting stuck in the spokes or dragging on the ground, when Chris rode up.
  13. lure
    provoke someone to do something through persuasion
    All I could think of was luring the chickens into the dog crate.
  14. sprawl
    sit or lie with one's limbs spread out
    I wasn’t so graceful, though; I fell off my bike at the bottom and ended up sprawled in the dirt as Chris crouched down behind a group of thistles.
  15. hunch
    round one's back by bending forward
    But I could still feel my shoulders hunched almost up to my ears as I walked across the short grass toward the shed.
  16. eaves
    the overhang at the lower edge of a roof
    But I made it to the shed, and ducked under the short eave.
  17. speckle
    a small contrasting part of something
    Peering through the window, I could see three chickens I didn’t know in the shed, brown with white-and-black speckles, and then I held my breath.
  18. contentment
    happiness with one's situation in life
    Then the others joined in, all fluffing and rolling around, looking like their bones had melted away, like jellyfish chickens, clouds of dust everywhere, clucking their contentment.
  19. hypothetical
    based primarily on surmise rather than adequate evidence
    “Gregory, speaking purely hypothetically, how would you keep your chickens safe if someone wanted to steal them from you?”
  20. claim
    assert or affirm strongly
    “Purely hypothetically,” he said, “I would want to make sure everyone who knew poultry in this town knew they were mine. So no one could claim there was a mistake. So I’d take them to the poultry show.”
  21. quail
    a small game bird
    Then there’s the other half of the room, where I was, which is mostly kids (and chickens and ducks and turkeys and geese and I think maybe quail and also one ostrich), where nobody is very quiet at all.
  22. tolerate
    allow without opposing or prohibiting
    Of course, we would never tolerate a chicken thief in our community.
  23. emphasis
    intensity or forcefulness of expression
    I typed “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog” like Mom taught me, to check that they hadn’t messed up the keys, and then a little bit of !&$?! for emphasis.
  24. formerly
    at a previous time
    i, agnes taylor, do leave to miss sophie brown the remainder of my poultry business, formerly known as redwood farm, including all my remaining poultry currently held by other keepers.
  25. missive
    a written message addressed to a person or organization
    i know you may be somewhat surprised to receive this missive from me at this point, but that was how i wished it to be done.
Created on Wed Mar 15 15:59:14 EDT 2023 (updated Wed Mar 22 16:24:03 EDT 2023)

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