Editor's note: This column originally ran Aug. 17, 2010. The numbers were promising: at $75 for 50 chicks, we couldn't go wrong. Our friend Nat had a brooder box we could use for the first several ...

The notion that one shouldn’t count one’s chickens before they have hatched has been around for centuries, but for an African boy named Tobi, there isn’t much else to do. Tobi’s friends all have ...