Bringing Metal To Life

Hamish Mackie’s sculpture work is internationally renowned and includes a cockerel’s head.

- Jeremy Hobson

Bearing in mind the detail on one of your latest sculptures, it looks as if you are very much au-fait with chickens – do you keep any in the garden?

We used to keep the ubiquitous ‘brown jobs’ – ex-battery hens – but got fed up with the foxes killing them. We now get eggs from our neighbour in return for them using our chicken equipment. I enjoyed keeping them though. It’s nice to give ex-battery hens a good life. They arrive with hardly any feathers and frightened of grass but soon settle in. You can’t beat a home grown fresh egg in the morning!

When did you first realise you had an interest in chickens?