What We Need Is Here

Are backyard chickens pets?

I knew this question was going to come up eventually. Last week one of our four-year old chickens became obviously ill. Henrietta had been the head of our flock of four. Aloof and bossy, she regularly chased the other three away from the feeder when she was eating and would even go after Rudy the Corgi if he ventured too close. A personality change was the first sign something was up; she suddenly became nicer and quieter, letting us pet her, leaving the other chickens alone. And then she needed help climbing into her nesting box at night, and didn't come out on her own in the morning. At that point - around day 5 - we were pretty sure she was sick, and we had to ask ourselves, "Is Henrietta livestock? or a pet?" 

If she were livestock, it might be time to "cull." We decided she was a pet. And then the big Pet Question raised its head: "What are we willing to pay for treatment by a vet?  We came up with a random figure and John hauled Henrietta to a local veterinarian who specializes in birds. He came back with liquid feed, a tube, a syringe and antibiotics. Her belly was distended indicating possible egg-binding and/or infection. Since the cost of x-rays to see if she was egg-bound was prohibitive, we treated her for infection only. After three "feedings," it was clear she was not getting better and was - sorry for this - now puking up the food a few hours after we pumped it in. She didn't seem in distress, so we put her in a box lined with soft cotton rags and brought her inside where it was cooler and bug-free. She died that night.

The sweet vet offered us a free necropsy and we found it was egg yolk peritonitis - egg yolk lodged in the ovaduct, causing a bacterial infection. If we had caught it earlier, we could have started the antibiotics sooner, but it may not have helped. Egg yolk pertonitis is often fatal. I am still not sure whether we did the right thing by Henrietta, but that is always the burden on those of us who "own" animals. 

Rest in peace, Henrietta. You were a mean girl, but we liked you a lot - kind of like a pet.  

Rudy the Corgi meets his nemesis - baby Henrietta

Backyard chicken takeover

We introduced our two little chickens to the big, 2-year old hens a few weeks ago and now clearly understand the term "pecking order." We were warned that an aggressive, established hen can really harm a "teenager," so we kept them in a screened off area of the coop for two weeks until they either got used to each other or the little ones grew big enough to defend themselves. After a few trial runs, we're now letting them all free in the backyard. Fortunately young chickens are good flyers, and Becky and Delilah can get out of Henrietta's way pretty quickly when they need to, which is relatively often still.  Charlotte, the other big chicken, just removes herself.

The whole process has been some trouble.  And Henrietta made me feel so angry and protective at times (like a mother hen?) that I fantasized about putting her in a stew pot to show her who was boss. Charlotte's contribution has been to slip between the fire escape stairs and run furiously around to the front garden where she can avoid the fracas and peacefully dig up flowers.

It made me wonder how we became part of this so-called "backyard chicken" movement; are we so susceptible to fads and trends? I had liked chickens since I was a little girl chasing, feeding, and catching the ones on my grandparents' property. But as city-dwellers, it took the groundswell of urban chicken tending and changes in city codes to inspire us to get some of our own. They seemed to fit in well with our dreams of growing as much food as we could at our city home – although as vegetarians we don't eat them, just their eggs (the stew pot thought was pure revenge).

Even now, despite the threat of backyard carnage and the reality of front-yard deflowerstation, I do like having them for the most part. I've known them all since they were babies. They are interesting and funny, sassy and fierce.  Their freakishly narrow faces and weird dinosaur legs are balanced out by their lovely feathers, and the occasional green egg.  Like the child I used to be, I enjoy feeding them strawberries out of hand and just sitting out on the back steps watching them.  Clearly, I'm not much of a farmer. But I do remember now the same old (and I mean old) chickens at my grandfather's house year after year, way past their prime, forever avoiding the stew pot. I think some of us just find pleasure in living with animals (who stay outside, are relatively quiet, and once in a while lay an egg). It's a family tradition. 

 {photos: top - Becky and Delilah out and about; bottom - Riley and mean old Henrietta}

Adolescents

They just don't stay little for long... Our chickens are now both laying regularly - 10 to 12 eggs per week between the two of them. We just started buying some new feed so aren't sure yet exactly how much these eggs are costing us; we should be able to add it up soon. on. We have been purchasing large bags of traditional pellets and crumbles from our beloved Gainesville Feed and Seed.   But now Earth Pets is selling a locally-made organic mixture that we had to try. Earth Pets now has a second location within bike-riding distance from our house - an irresistible combination.

It's been a great experience raising these chicks from babies and we're really enjoying using their pretty eggs. Besides delicious quiche, we've been deviling them and adding them to pancakes and scones.

Now that they're laying, we're going to experiment with letting Henrietta and Charlotte roam around the backyard (hopefully only the backyard) soon. I love the deep yellow-yolked eggs free-roaming chickens lay thanks to all the extra back-yard greens (well, flowers and fern mostly) they eat.

We've got home-layed eggs!

Henrietta's first eggs - they're a bit greener in real life

This weekend, John heard a loud squawking outside that kept escalating. The last time he heard a sound like that was when there was a possum in the nesting box (the time before that, a snake).  So he rushed down to see Charlotte running around in circles along the perimeter of the coop and Henrietta's head sticking out of the box making all the noise. Opening the back of the box, he looked in expecting to see a varmint, but instead he found an egg. Next John began running around squawking about the egg and the miracle thereof. Hopefully the process will become a little more peaceful with time.

Now we have two gray-green eggs from Henrietta, still awaiting Charlotte's. They will probably become "house eggs" as opposed to the the 14 dozen we buy each week and boil up for for the breakfast brigade. They may well end up being boiled, though, since they're such a handy little pre-packaged snack that way.

Which gets to a point I want to make regarding boiling eggs. I have seen people boil the bejeezus out of an egg, randomly letting it boil till it's convenient to remove it from the stove, or thinking it needs to boil for fifteen minutes to avoid being runny. The results are rubbery and, worse, the outside of the yolk turns as grey-green as one of Henrietta's eggshells. It's easy to avoid this and it saves energy as well. Place the egg(s) in lukewarm tap water in a pot. Cover and bring to a boil (covering it will help it boil faster). As soon as eggs begin to boil, turn off the heat and leave covered for 12- 18 minutes (12 for small eggs, 18 for very large eggs). I have no idea where I learned this, but no doubt from some frugal-cooking-quickly cookbook from my past. The eggs look so much more attractive when boiled this way, and you'll save some electricity/gas by not keeping the burner on for so long. Oh, the knowledge this tired and sometimes grumpy mind holds. 

All cooped up!

 
At last! The chickens are out of the house! We were all ready for the transition. Chickens have a particular chicken-smell (nothing like fricassee) that grows along with them. It was so time to go.

John was a great sport about taking on this project. The plans we ordered were wonderful, but assumed some carpentry experience that he does not have. With a little help from some friends - Mohamed, Leroy, Luis, Miguel, and Patrick, the job got done and looks surprisingly like the lovely coop that handyman Dennis Harrison-Noonan designed.  Thank you Dennis - and everyone!

Special features include rodent- and drunken college student-proof doors with latches - a human-sized one for entering the outdoor area, a chicken sized one for entering the coop with nesting boxes, and a hand-sized one in the back for gathering eggs from the outside. It looks like it will be warm in winter, cool in summer, with plenty of space to run and scratch around. I don't know if you can tell, but Henrietta (the tall blonde) and Charlotte are extremely pleased. Me too.

Everything is growing!

It seems like every time I round the corner into the family room I come face to face with two totally different chickens. It's hard to believe they were two little peeps who could fit together into a custard cup just two weeks ago. Today they seem to have twice the amount of real feathers they had yesterday and they look as gawky as middle schoolers. We're going to have to come up with a larger pen for them while they grow old enough to go outdoors (just two more weeks).

Same thing with the garden. The seeds we planted two weeks ago are little plants in the garden now and the transplants are twice as big in spite of the recent cold snap.

It's happening everyplace. Our bucket at the farmers' market runneth over. Each week after we buy what we can afford, we leave a bucket out for farmers to put any leftover produce in that they want to donate to our soup. This week we had about four buckets full - so much that we ended up giving some away to families in our neighborhood. It was nice to think of all those steaming pots of collards, mustards, and turnips on Easter day.  And we still  have plenty for a week's worth of healthy soup.

I love this time of year - beautiful weather, new life, new leaves, new growth everywhere. It is good.

Chicks arrived!

Henrietta and Charlotte, three day-old Ameraucana chicks arrived Monday. While Ameraucanas may not be the most beautiful breed of chicken, they have a reputation for being friendly and they lay blue and green eggs, which totally sold us. I think it's okay to give them names since they'll be layers, not fricassee (as long as our housemate Mohamed doesn't get to them first: "Do no worry, Kelli, I will take care of them; I will see that they are fattened up...").

This is our second try at chicken-raising, our first with little chicks. Our former "flock" came to us fully grown, and we left them behind during our move from our suburban home to our new one downtown. Unfortunately, Henny, LouAnne and Junebug came to a sad end when a possum invaded their unclosed nesting box one night, and we decided to put the chicken-raising on hold for a bit.  In our new part of town, John is more afraid of drunken frat boys (we live near downtown bars) stealing a chicken for fun than he is of wildlife. I wonder what kind of "design" he'll come up with this time.

Meanwhile, our little girls are in the family room growing up under a heat lamp. Baby chick care is fairly simple so far, requiring only a large box, backyard leaf litter, feed, water and the heat lamp (they are supposed to be at 95 degrees the first week, decreasing week by week down to 80, after which they can go outside). They're cute, tiny little things and I feel as amazed as any child when one climbs into my hand.

Always on the cutting edge, Gainesville has allowed two hens per family for many years. Now, all over the country, folks are changing their city charters to allow chickens and even pigmy goats. It's becoming quite a trendy thing to do; but more than that, I think it's also another sign of people wanting to be more connected to their food and to give their children a little more connection to the stuff of real life.  Now we just need to disconnect Rudy the Corgi from his real life role of predator.

Thanks, Girls!

Hmmm... We've been out of town at Joe's graduation, and I had written a post about our chickens and scheduled to show up on Friday night.  And now it is gone.  I guess even these new-fangled, user-friendly blogging sites foul up once in a while.  Or I did.  Anyway, here's what I was going to say about chickens!

I wanted them for years before we got them and had collected a file of instructions about feeding and housing them.  Not being at all handy, I think I was waiting for that day when I had acquired enough skills to follow coop-building directions.   That was not happening, but John - who is less fearful of failure than I am - just  up and did it anyway last summer.  He thought up a coop, bought the supplies and it was finished in a few days. 

It's by no means perfect.  We had to add a door once we realized how heavy it was to lift to get at the food and water.  And the heaviness is an issue he hadn't thought of in building a "chicken tractor" - a small, movable, bottomless coop for scooting around the garden so chickens can scratch and "fertilize" fallow areas.  John thought he was opting for a more sturdy coop when he used heavy boards.  Suffice it to say it doesn't actually move without borrowing the labor of friends and neighbors.  So it's more of a small coop instead of a "tractor."

 

But it's working fine. We get about five eggs per week from each of our three girls - more than enough for our family.  While we don't have good records on what we've spent on feed, the chickens range freely on a regular basis and so don't eat as much as they might. 

We wonder what will happen as they age and don't produce many eggs.  I remember my grandparents' chickens, many of which I grew up with; several had to be at least a decade old.  I have a feeling that, like them, I would find it hard to cook up Henny, LouAnn and Junebug - serving "Pet Pot Pie" as my brother called it when he and his kids slaughtered and ate their rooster.

For right now, we 'll just enjoy the eggs and not worry too much about the future.