The Girls

"Good morning Ladies!!!!" I say conjuring up my best Howie Mandel via Deal or No Deal. The morning ritual of letting our chickens out for the day always begins the same. They start clucking around 6 and are down right angry by 7, spoiled rotten hens. I admittedly thought my husband was crazy for even suggesting chickens. When he started spouting off how easy and beneficial it would be for us all I was seriously impressed! "you don't read your own magazines, do you?" he told me. Yes its true I had picked up a copy of Mother Earth News drawn in by the article on cheese making (which turned out to be a complete chapter on cheese from Barbera Kingsolvers book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle which I had JUST finished reading, you cannot possibly make it through that book w/o completely changing how you eat but that's another post.) so anyhow! there was an article on backyard chickens which apparently my husband DID read and was hooked! Off to the hatchery for 6 hens (we affectionately refer to as rescue chickens), we made a coop and a run and called it good. Or so we thought. After a couple days we thought they really would be happier wandering our 1/3 acre lot and so they were released. Granted w/ a certain amount of trepidation being that we have a Brittany who by design is not just a hunting dog but a BIRD hunting dog, which my husband has taken on various bird hunting trips. OH NO!!! she sees them and charges....then stops....they all stop...she walks off. great bird dog. They all live in bliss today. We are trying to train her to at least chase the wayward cat that notices them, GET THE KITTY, GET THE KITTY!!!!! we scream and she runs frantically outside, that's the end of the spurt before it even gets started, luckily its usually enough to frighten the felines away. They are my future dinner not yours!!!! We have a deal see, you produce eggs and I will give you all the room you want and all the fruit/veg/garden scraps you can imagine! They are in bliss and Im getting a steady supply of eggs from most...Snowflake as we have named her was molting when we got her, has since stopped and best start producing soon or she may be the first to go. This IS something I at least plan on, not doing mind you, that will be left up to my husband. Its the circle of life, I am an omnivore, this I know. I promise their life is 10 thousand times better than any chicken found at the local grocery store, I will not feel bad, we will simply "rescue" some more and the cycle will continue. We're hoping to make it to the spring w/all 6, happy and healthy so please don't start mourning any losses just yet. For now they'll have to put up w/being hand fed farmer's market nectarines from a 4 year old. Spoiled rotten hens.