Writer's flock

Jeremy Hobson talks to smallholder, chicken keeper and thriller writer Shaun Baines

- Jeremy Hobson

What first got you interested in chickens – and did it coincide with your move to rural Scotland?

 Country living and chickens go hand in hand. We actually started with keeping bees, which we still do, but they are considerably less cuddly than chickens.

What breeds of chickens do you have?

 We began with Welsummers, which are beautiful, if flighty birds. We then bought Barnevelders, who are calmer and more self-assured. Each gang have their own cockerel named after characters in Blackadder: ‘Speckled Jim’ runs the Welsummers, ‘Lord Flashheart’ heads the Barnevelders. We keep them separate, otherwise it’s like watching the Jets and the Sharks in a feathery dance-off.

Your soon-to-be published book is a ‘crime thriller’… what is it about the genre that excites you?