nesters, not roosters

When the hens turn in for the night, they gravitate to the highest roosts.  We learned this by error, not trial. As new chicks would grow into hens, it would dawn on us that we were low on roosting real estate, so we’d add another crossbar. Since the roost sits on a slope, the new roosts were higher off the ground, and in no time at all, the alpha hens had taken possession of them. Though we had not anticipated this, it had a certain logic and we accepted it as the way of nature.

Last spring, we brought home to black bantam chicks.  One grew into a very unbantam-like giant which often lays double-yoked eggs.  She struggles to get her heavy body over the roost’s threshold in the morning, so hopping up onto the roost in the evening is out of the question. She spends the night in a little hollow on the ground, where’s she’s safe as long as we remember to latch the roost door every night.

The other black chick grew into a sweet little hen with only one good foot. Recently, she, too, has started spending the night on the ground in a little hollow. The other hens probably won’t let her stay up with them, since she’s by herself, or she may not be able to get around on the roost very well.

Like Mary, she likes to linger in her bed in the morning, and so, like Mary, she receives room service. Mary takes hot tea, and she has to be on a pretty tight schedule before she’ll decamp without it. The little hen didn’t fill out a room service card, but she seems to appreciate the handful of scratch I scatter near her when the flock is busy elsewhere.

So my understanding of chickens, and my own life, progress in unexpected directions. Hens now roost on the ground, and my life as husband & father takes on increasingly unforeseen roles, first husbandry & now bellhop.

On the other hand, though I did not see this coming, neither did I foresee the rewards of long-marriage, or kindness to chickens.

Coo, coo, ca choo.

the manner of chickens

It’s been a good summer.  Having built our endurance with several hikes already, on Saturday four of us made it clear across Jefferson Park before circling back off the trail through sub-alpine terrain, before rejoining the trail for the return trip to the car. This comes at a price, of course, 13 miles, and each successive mile extracts a higher toll.

My companions were naturally curious about why I had chosen a destination so far from the trailhead, and whether I had long been disposed toward fanaticism.  The answer to the first question is easy, because it is there, and I want to see it, and to the latter, yes, but usually with games involving cards.

True, it makes for a long day, but it’s still a simpler proposition that backpacking in for the night, & hiking out the next day.  Do you trade away aching feet, or a night of sleeping in your own bed; a home-cooked dinner or a pot on a camp stove?  This, and an abiding faith in the doctrine of fitness, pushing the envelope, testing your limits, working through pain.

None of which is manner of chickens. Chickens rise early to cherry-pick the scratch, forage about the berm while the day is still cool, and then settle under a shady bough to wait out the heat of the day. Have I learned nothing after a decade of chicken husbandry? Chickens would hike in & chill out, then rise early to hike out in time to chill again.

Maybe their message is making inroads. On Sunday, I puttered about the yard before taking a late lunch, then took a long nap, and woke up feeling refreshed. Chickens are not long-lived themselves, but the human who heeds them might well add the span of a chicken’s lifetime to his own.

Coo, coo, ca choo.

the right bird

As clouds literally gather in the gulf, the Republicans assemble in Florida, and the country’s future once again hangs in the balance.  As the candidates and their families are presented to the nation, I find myself reflecting on how the chicken is poorly suited for modern politics. 

Imagine cameras zooming in as a rooster of magnificent plumage ascends to the podium, but instead of spewing platitudes, the talking head casts nervously about, as if cats lurked behind the bunting. Checking the stage for earwigs on national TV does not boost the confidence of one’s constituency, and they come to doubt your ability to rescue them following a hurricane.

The chicken is not the only bird unsuited for mass media. The hawk perched on a powerline evokes wiretaps, the wide-eyed owl blinking “who, me?” makes us wonder if there’s cold cash stashed in the office freezer. We know the nuthatch flitting from branch to branch can’t spell tomato, and the bushtit, by virtue of it’s name alone, brings to mind the Monkey Business and fact-finding trips to Argentina.

On the other hand, the hummingbirds who convene annually at our feeder, would do well in Congress, as they quarrel continuously, and despite the ruckus, manage to sneak in & siphon off a little syrup for themselves from time to time.  A turkey will never head a presidential ticket, but by virtue of it’s name, and native roots, could make an admirable vice-president.

Benjamin Franklin denigrated the character of the bald eagle, but it’s nomination for the national bird was visionary.  How can we not be impressed by its furrowed brow and intense gaze?  It’s tongue may not be golden, but it’s beak certainly is.  Instead of dropping into the convention by parachute, it soars in through an open window, circles above the frenzied delegates & lights on the dais before the microphones.  Our hearts catch in our throats as it stares into the camera.  We love this bird!  Reporters may notice the stench of dead fish, but we’re in no mood for their ungrateful grumbling.

Coo, coo, ca choo!

morning, noon & night

The hens are friends who crowd around the door of the roost to greet me at the first sound of my footsteps each morning.  They are genial neighbors who rise from their porches in welcome when I drop by for a visit in the middle of the day.

But in the evening, when I saunter benevolently down to latch the roost door, ensuring their safe passage through the night, they cast about with nervous glances, as if expecting that I will ask to see their green cards.

Lousy ingrates!  Can they not know that I am literally saving their lives, as I did the night before, and all the nights before that?

Apparently not tonight, and probably not tomorrow night either.  I latch the door and cheerfully bid them good evening, then latch the gate & stroll reflectively back to the house.

We yearn for that which we cannot obtain.  Tomorrow evening, the fading light will catch my eye, turning my thoughts to chickens, and I will, once again, saunter hopefully down the gravel path.

Coo, coo, ca choo.

a menacing stargazer

The spotlight of the late-rising crescent moon blinked through the trees.  Perseus soared high overhead, vaulting the earth as he has since the beginning of imagination.

Against the staid background of constellations, meteors flashed soundlessly.  Most vanished within the first heartbeat, but some few rained stardust from long white wakes.

Silent as the celestial shower, the hens listened apprehensively to the approach of heavy footsteps on the pavement next to the roost, the creaking protests of an old chaise lounge, a muffled rustle as a blanket was shaken out.  A long silence, then more rustling, creaking & heavy footfall, now receding in the direction of the dark house.

The reassuring silence slowly regrouped. Under the roost, moonlight flecked the ground as a breeze moved through the maples.  A hen rustled her feathers, and they waited together for the night to end.

Coo, coo, ca choo.

what better to do?

The decorous succession of clear, but well-tempered days seduced my weathered skepticism so I was caught off-guard when the sun came a-blazing this weekend.

Rather than frying an egg on the driveway, Mary departed for Dallas (Oregon) and returned in high spirits, charmed by the rural town and packing almost a dozen fertile eggs, which she nestled them under our broody buff orpington (ie big hen with golden feathers, who sits all day in her nesting box, for the uninitiated).

All went swimmingly until the next afternoon, when, with the thermometer nearing 100, our designated mother-to-be bolted the stifling coop for the first time in weeks.  A tense development, to be sure, since the eggs need her body heat to incubate.  Fortunately, she returned to the eggs instead of roosting up,  so, with no other option, we decided it was just the heat & that the eggs would be ok.

a portrait of the brooder as a young hen

A repeat occurrence the next afternoon made us more confident in our diagnoses.  Baking in the sun, the air in the coop felt like it might soft-boil the eggs - we united behind our hen in sympathy.

In a couple weeks, if the eggs haven’t hatched, we’ll check one to see how it tastes with toast.  Stay tuned...

Coo, coo, ca choo.

winnowing

The hens start each day with scratch.  Then they bustle over to the bank of yard clippings topped with kitchen compost to take account of our recent deposits, and to make withdrawals of any bite-sized visitors unlucky enough to have dropped by during business hours.


All this gets the day off to a swell start, but for real sustenance, they turn to the pellets filling the little bin in the coop.  The bin is a simple, but clever contraption that automatically refills the trough in its base by means of gravity & friction. Unbelievably, it functions perfectly without a timer or any LED’s.


Lately, I’ve noticed fine dust collecting in the trough, as if something has changed in the production or transporting of the pellets.  I didn’t like the idea of the hens feeding from a dust bin.


I remembered from grade school the description of settlers winnowing grain, separating wheat from the chaff by tossing baskets of grain into the air so the wind would carry away the chaff.  Wind power, why not?


I filled a bucket with pellets, climbed on a low stump, and poured slowly into a second bucket on the ground.  It might have worked better in Oklahoma (where the wind comes sweeping down the Plains) but a little plume of dust trailed off downwind from the cascading pellets.  A qualified success, new entertainment for the hens, and thanks to our rural setting, no witnesses.


I’ve tested a number of variations since then.  I’ve learned to check for an actual breeze before starting, and to hold off if the stump is slick from rain.  It’s been a while since I’ve positioned the lower bucket upwind from the stump.  The persistent, still unresolved problem is how to remove the pellets from the second bucket, which has to be more wide-mouthed than the first to catch all the pellets.


All good lessons, even if a coarse strainer turned out to be a better solution.  Another simple device, gravity-fed, and battery-free.


Coo, coo, ca choo.

before Firefox, Foxfire

I enjoy starting fires, so I forsook Firefox for Foxfire and set up my chopsaw in the chicken run next to a stack of branches.  Too thick to cut with loppers, but to small to split, we like the small firewood we make from the branches because it catches fire with very little kindling, and spreads the flames to the bigger pieces.

My project was great news for the hens, as the insects that take up residence in a woodpile are a favorite snack food.  The alpha, beta & gamma hens worked over the newly cleared ground in a flurry of scratching & pecking.  I heard a low growl and looked up in time to see a buff orpington bent low to the ground with neck feathers fanned out & wings half-spread, warning off a barred rock that had trespassed on her claim.

A noisy day in a bucolic weekend.  The woodpiles are gone, the firewood stacked higher. The hens were entertained, and their yokes may be a little more yellow from the extra protein.

I built a little fire from the short ends and started it with one match.  A good day, all in all, unless Mary is still mad at me...

Coo, coo, ca choo.

a rooster votes in the night

I closed the front door quietly behind me and stepped out into the starlight.  The night was calm, the dark silhouettes of the cedars & pine rose motionless from the chicken run.

I stood listening for a moment, then turned my attention to the constellations shimmering above the black conifers.

This photo, from culinate.com is captioned

“Four roosters detracted from our idyllic life”.

A rooster crowing in the distance brought my mind back to earth.

We always end up with a couple roosters when we buy new chicks.  Their aggressive behavior marks them weeks before they starting testing the air with their first hoarse calls.  We run an ad offering free roosters and they quickly disappear.

Though sunrise was still hours away, I decided to open the polls.  It was time to settle a nagging question.  Should we keep a rooster from our next batch of chicks, to protect the hens from cats, and possibly produce a few chicks?

The rooster crowing in the night cast a no vote.  The polls closed, the vote was unanimous.  The referendum failed.  I returned to the house, quietly closing the door behind me.

Coo, coo, ca choo.

outwitted, again

The new fence has been effective thus far in its short life, but trouble looms ahead.  For the most part, the hens stay on their side, and we stay on ours, life is in balance.  True, the chicken run now resembles a small nation struggling to keep illegal immigration at bay, but it’s reassuring to know that we can retreat to it if a herd of cattle ever comes stampeding through our yard.

We added brown leghorns (“leggerns”) to our flock by accident, but we came to like them as they grew into striking hens, with lacey plumage on their necks and big white ear lobes like Lyndon Johnson.  Hatcheries market the breed as a good choice for free-ranging flocks because they are alert for predators and athletic, but as a human who asks only to love my property & be loved in return, they are rather trying because they flee in panic whenever I approach.  So I am not inclined to flatter them with adjectives like clever or resourceful.

So I was surprised to find a leghorn working it’s way around the house soon after the fence crew had packed it up.  Not just once, but almost every day. Worse yet, she was scaling the fence by launching herself from the limbs of the run’s graceful vine maple, a tree I could prune only at risk of ugly divorce or painful death, or both.

Outwitted, again, and this time by a chicken of suspect intelligence. The hens yearn for freedom.  I lie awake in the dark & ask myself, what if the other hens follow her up the tree?  We might as well pull down the fence, but then where could we run from a stampede?

Coo, coo, ca choo.

declaration of co-dependence

Evidently, the Declaration of Independence enshrines some, but not all of life’s self-evident truths. For example, It is evident to me that humans, not hens, who will record the history of people and poultry, though you will find no reference to this in that venerable document.

The history of Millie, the bantam hen, is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny.  Never have I challenged her for light or transient causes, nor have I attempted to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over her, yet I have been subjected to a long train of repeated abuses and injuries (!),
impairing my pursuit of happiness :-( .

To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.

She has for a long time, opposed with manly firmness the peaceful collection of eggs, a task formidable to tyrants only :-( .

She has combined with others to raise chicks foreign to my affection :-( .

She has, in times of peace, emitted a loud cry of alarm when I enter the coop :-( .

I have warned her from time to time.  I have reminded her of her circumstances.

I have appealed to my wife, who is deaf to the voice of justice :-( .

It is said that history is written by the victors, but speaking for myself, this is not a truth, evidently.

Coo, coo, ca choo   : -)

the domestics' tranquility

Most of the feed is eaten by the squirrels, but we still call it a bird feeder. It sits on a stout pole under an aging maple tree, which threatens to obliterate it by randomly showering down rotten branches.

It does attract birds in addition to squirrels, and in our early chicken-years, it was a favorite hangout of the hens.  Every morning they would pour out of the keep en masse, round the garden shed & waddle up the front steps to get to the black sunflower seed spilled beneath it by the squirrels & jays.

Now that they are cut off from the feeder, the hens appear to remember the generosity of their wild kin.  I scatter their measure of scratch each morning & head down to the cul-de-sac for the newspaper.  By the time I return, band-tailed pigeons and blue jays have doubled the population on the ground.

The hens are always chasing each other away from the feed, but no heed is paid to this new crowd that only shows up for breakfast.  As I approach, the jays back off in an untrustworthy manner, but the skittish pigeons head for the tree tops where I can hear their heavy wingbeats as they move from branch to branch.  The hens don’t look up, pigeons, what pigeons?

Coo, coo, ca choo.

the chick or the eggs?

Cosmolopsically speaking, I vote for the chicken, but for me personally, it was the eggs.

For several decades before encountering an actual chicken in the wild, I had to learn how to cope with eggs.  Swallowing them with a bite of toast got me through breakfast.  Afternoon eggs, deviled or hard boiled, weren’t so egg-like, or could be rendered edible by the extravagant application of salt.

Then, in the winter of 1978, having developed an interest in woodworking, I began making daily trips to my grandparents' house, first to refinish a delicate writing desk my grandfather had made as a young man, and then to build a cabinet for my parents.  I worked with my grandfather’s tools in his dark garage which was lined with shelves of narrow cedar boxes filled with salvaged fastenings.  A little door next to the vice opened so a long board could extend outside through the wall.


My grandparents enjoyed the return of their prodigal grandson, so long as I left each evening with the garage as orderly & clean as on the morning I first arrived.  One day, my grandmother offered to make me lunch, and when I sat down, placed before me a plate of scrambled eggs like I had never seen before, which no amount of salt or toast could have improved.


Several years later, when it was too late to ask, and remembering only that she had added some parmesan cheese, I set myself the task of recreating her eggs.  Failing repeatedly, I chanced upon an article on egg scrambling methods and, so found in my skillet one morning a passable resemblance to my culinary grail.

I make my grandmother’s eggs by adding a touch of milk to a couple eggs, which I whip energetically with a fork, to mix in air.  I cook them quickly in butter, stirring all the while so they will cook uniformly, removing them from the pan as the last runniness disappears.  If all goes well, a soft, yellow cloud of eggs graces the plate.

They may not be my grandmother’s eggs exactly, but they are as close to them, and to heaven, as I will ever be.


Coo, coo, ca choo.

the old man & the hen

The hen is not young, but she is many years younger than him.

Of all the hens in the flock, only she seeks him out, asking for attention.  He feels a special bond with her because of this, though he knows she shares her affections with anyone who enters the run.

Does she want to be stroked, or is she hoping he will let her peck at the cans of feed before he scatters their contents under the cedar?  He would prefer not to know.

Her loyalty is fleeting.  He knows that as soon as he turns his back, she’ll try to slip around him to get to the open gate. 

She is a pragmatist.  She never dreams of storms or flight.

He is sentimental.  He wants to protect her.  He watches for cats in the dusk.

Coo, coo, ca choo.

oval argument

Life has been uneventful in the chicken run, making it more difficult to generate a story every Monday morning.  None of the hens are running for president, and so, are not in sync with the daily, or even weekly, news cycle. Someday, a female will be elected to the highest office in the land, but she will probably be a species of mammal, not a bird, and definitely not a chicken.

Performance during the debates will be a major obstacle for any bird aspiring to higher office, but the achilles heel for chickens specifically is national defense.  Defense is a thorn in the side of many human politicians, but “chicken" is an especially loaded term in this regard, and unlikely to be overcome the political advantages of having been raised on a family farm.

Coo, coo, ca choo

the keep

I spent all day Sunday on my knees, replacing the wire on the roost, the chickens' inner sanctum.  I was thankful that I discovered how rust had set it free from it’s earthly bonds (staples) before raccoons swung down in a chariot of fire and not-so-sweetly carried the hens away.

I’ve struggled with my chicken-architecture terminology.  I thought I had settled on coop, roost & yard to describe the homey trinity we have cobbled together with our humble carpentry skills, but as I labored in the unseen light of the waning paschal full moon, I realized I was fortifying the hens’ keep, employing a medieval strategy dating back 1000 years.

Mary & I entered the ancient keep of Marvao as we honeymooned in Portugal 25 years ago, though we thought naught of chickens at the time.  The perfectly-preserved castle rises from one end of a fortified mountaintop village, unprotected by ticket-takers or docents.  We walked through a manicured garden, entering through a narrow slit optimized for defending with lances, and mounted the walls on a narrow stone staircase.  It was a sunny weekday morning, the castle was unoccupied, all we could hear was the wind.  We followed the parapet along the perimeter to a squat tower with a dark doorway.  Through the doorway was a square windowless room, perfect for storing wine, or a desperate last stand.

The hens' keep sits next to a lovely garden. You access it through a gate, though without fear of being lanced.  So it’s a lot like Marvao, except for the medieval village, stone stairway, underground cistern, mountaintop ringed by castle wall, and 360˚ view.

Coo, coo, ca choo.

what almost happened

Our flock started twelve years ago with 8 chicks.  We named each hen, and surprisingly, they all lived long lives, except for Joe, Rex’s favorite, a white crested black polish, who was killed by a hawk one Saturday morning.

Now we have a secure roost, a big, fenced enclosure, and the experience to know that we’re doing well if half the new chicks in any one year live out their natural lives.  We added 6 chicks who would develop into sturdy hens last spring, and just two remain.

We’re getting lots of eggs this year, and with 14 hens, the flock is about average.  Unfortunately, we recently learned about marans, a breed that lays dark brown (“chocolate" eggs), so, of course, we wanted some.  Marans are a new breed, or a breed that’s new in the U.S., so they’re not easy to find.  After sorting through search results that started with Oklahoma, Kansas & Dhangadhi, we located some nearby in Brownsville.

Murray McMurray Hatchery Egg Photo Contest 3rd Place

The farm had a lot of chicks available, so we had a lively discussion about how many to buy.  Somehow, we decided that if we wanted a few chocolate egg layers, we needed a dozen new chicks, despite Rex wanting more chickens like Joe, and 8 being the most chicks we had ever added in one year.  We called, emailed & texted the sellers to let them know we were moderately interested in stopping by and quickly had an appointment for the next morning.

Luckily, our giddy buyers’ high wore off after a good night’s sleep.  Doubling the size of the flock no longer seemed like the great idea it had been 24 hours earlier.  We decided against the drive to Brownsville & texted our regrets.

So there are no chocolate eggs in your future yet, but stay posted.  There will be chicks for sale in the feed stores until June...

Coo, coo, ca choo.

egg hunt

We’ve all heard stories about skunks & racoons getting into chicken coops, or of chickens escaping from them.  It’s not that it’s hard to build a predator-tight refuge,  but it’s expensive. Eggs are cheap, baby chicks cost about $1, and you have already invested in fences & coops, so if you’re getting by, it’s a lot easier just to keep getting by.

A few summers ago, we rebuilt the fence around the chicken yard, so for a few days, the hens ran free, and laid their eggs where ever they pleased.  We found nests all around the house, in ivy, in tall grass, anywhere the ground cover provided a little privacy.

The coop where the hens roost up at night is small, so it’s not much trouble to keep it secure.  The fence around the chicken yard is another matter, and I’ve grown weary of hens pushing under or finding a way over it.  I wasn’t worried about losing eggs, the problem was the hens were much more persistent about getting out than getting back in.  If we didn’t open the gates before evening, they’d start roosting up on rooftops, steps or low trees, from which I’d have to extract them by flashlight when I came home from work.

So we left the hens in the coop & built a mighty fence.  It seemed like we collected more eggs than usual while the hens were cooped up, but I couldn’t be sure.  When the fence was ready, I was relieved to see that it worked.  With the hens confined to their yard all day, we kept getting “extra” eggs”.

So I decided I couldn’t wait for Easter & went on an egg hunt this weekend.  It didn’t take long to find a clutch of eggs in one of the hens’ old haunts, the ivy by the back door.  18 eggs!

Will we ever know if it’s the only place they were laying?

Coo, coo, ca choo.

the hens' latest thing

We often let the hens out in the afternoon.  Despite the size of their yard (it’s has a bigger footprint than our house), they gang up inside the gate as we approach in anticipation of their release.  They peck around in the grass outside their fence, and work their way up to the bird feeder to forage for sunflowers seeds.  Then they’ll make a circle around the house and on their way back to the coop.

I was surprised a couple weeks ago, when I saw a hen coming out of the fir grove near the street.  It’s not an encouraging development, if they’re that far from the house, they might attract a neighbor’s dog into our yard.

So this weekend, I played poultry gumshoe, and kept track of the hens as they fanned out across the yard.  Sure enough, half a dozen, the alpha clique, made their way past the bird feeder, across the lawn & down the hill through the trees.  They came to the fence next to our neighbor’s raspberry patch.  I’ve been mulching leaves there for several years to kill weeds along the fence.  Somehow, word about the worm-rich soil has spread through the flock, so the flock flocks to the fence to feed ;-)

Like me, the hens are easily bored, so they were soon strutting back up the hill.  No dogs were alerted on this day.  The hens roosted up as the daylight waned, I latched the gate, and collected the eggs that had magically appeared again in the nesting boxes.

Coo, coo, ca choo.