Dandelion Wine and Dick

My mother did not approve of alcohol by all accounts, but for years, she made and bottled dandelion wine. We used to help her pick the dandelions. She would buy oranges and lemons and let the brew ferment for what seemed a long time. Then she would bottle the brew and give it to friends and relatives. Everybody seemed to like it. Since she made it herself, and from fresh natural ingredients, she probably didn't regard it as an alcoholic beverage in any real sense. We as young kids were allowed to drink it; I remember it as tasting kind of fruity and very sweet. Anyway, when the time came to bottle the brew, she would strain the liquid and throw the fermented oranges and lemons out into her flower garden right outside the kitchen door. The year I got my pair of bantams, they were what would now be considered free-range poultry. Dick always scouted for food for Polly, so gallant on his part, and as it unfolded, almost so deadly. Dick found the fermented fruit slices, and clucked for Polly to join him, sampling each tidbit as he invited her to taste. We found Dick in the flower garden, and I thought he was dying---he was staggering, walking in circles, falling onto his side, and most alarming of all, he was throwing up. I hadn't even known it was possible for chickens to do that. He lived through it though, and never again was a drunken chicken.