The Crowing Nightmare

Cutest here.  Yep, we’re back. It's been an eventful time away from you. Happy 2025!

It’s 2:30 a.m.  A piercing scream awakens me one dark and unstormy night in Key West.  Shrieks continued, rhythmically but in no discernible order, decimating a quiet blackness.  Three, four, five in a row, then silence.  Ahhh, I think, it’s over.  But no, again and again.  From just one throat?  Or are there several?  It is, at the very least, some kind of crazed maniac.

Oh no, it’s just a rooster.  Or two.  But one that sounds like no other.  This guy is MAD.  Furious.  Determined to destroy all in his path or within auditory distance.  These are not the normal emanations which I greet typically with good cheer.  These are ear-splitting, violent cries that split the earth and bludgeon my eardrums.

Key West may be known for raucous music, Key Lime pie, bars galore, roving troops of tourists, good food (fries anyone?), Hemingway, Jimmy Buffet and Tennessee Williams. However, it’s also the home of a million, and I barely exaggerate here, chickens.  Both males and females wander the roads, the restaurants and the homes freely.  They are part of the culture.

Historically, some got loose from back yards both as egg-providers and before they became stew. In the 1980s, cockfighting (a "fun" sport) became illegal and those roosters were apparently set free. In 1998, Hurricane George scattered the chickens across the island.  Now Key West is the home to so many of these “gypsy” chickens that the city has occasionally tried to reduce their numbers, but I’d have to say any such efforts have not been successful.   

Roosters’ crowing is not just a sign of dawn awakening, although that officially begins their day of courting, protecting, unifying, or warning other roosters to stay away.  They do all this through their cock-a-doodle-dooing though I am here to say this screeching is more than just a simple c-a-d-dooing. This is the loudest war one can imagine.

I’ve lost! And am continuing to lose every night, anywhere from 2 a.m. to 6:30 a.m. when I finally give up.  And get up – to continue enjoying my lovely month with Cute where 60 degrees is considered chilly.

(And just fyi, I AM wearing earplugs.  I envy Cute’s partial hearing loss. Roosters’ crowing averages 80-90 decibels, up to 142 close to their head. That’s the average.  Have I mentioned this is no average rooster? For comparison, standing close to a chainsaw exposes you to about 120 decibels. This rooster has got to be at least that! At least. And perhaps he's standing in my bathroom.)