It all started with chickens.
It was our second wedding anniversary, and while we didn’t know it yet, the Covid Pandemic was just about to crack wide open. We were living in the suburbs, and that life was starting to chafe for my country boy husband, who is from the holler in West Virginia (read: waaaayyyy out in coal country). So naturally, he brought home a half dozen baby chicks from Tractor Supply to celebrate being married for two years, and as a inveterate animal lover, I was instantly smitten with the little fluff balls.
They were tiny, and it was still chilly out, so they were under a warming lamp, in a dog kennel, in my living room. I didn’t know it when we put them in there, but determined babies can slip out through the slats in a standard dog kennel, and they appear to enjoy roosting in curtains (after an initial near-heart-attack, all the babies were located and returned to the kennel, but with added side walls to keep them in). It was my very first chicken panic.
Lesson number one: chickens are really good at getting out of where they’re supposed to be. I would later learn lesson number two: chickens can get out, but they can’t figure out how to get back in, no matter how many times they’ve done it. The number of times I’ve climbed fences, hopped over gates, hiked through brambles, and chased down escapees is beyond counting, at this point.
I never really understood country people’s disdain for predators like hawks, foxes, racoons, and coyotes until I had chickens. Even in town, I had to chase a hawk off of one of my girls by throwing a log of firewood at it, scooping up my injured chicken, slathering her with triple antibiotic ointment, and keeping her in the basement bathroom for two weeks while she healed up from her injuries.
I started my amateur veterinarian career when I got chickens, too, and not just for the big things like hawk attacks. I have administered children’s aspirin, dissolved in water, by dropper, into beaks. I have created corrective paperboard shoes, attached with bandaids, to tiny chick feet that were growing crooked. I have learned about chicken electrolytes (Rooster Booster) for extreme weather conditions. I feed them high-calcium dried grubs, both for their health, and for egg quality. They get frozen corn and peas in the hot summer months for treats. We have heaters in the coop for the coldest nights. I even nursed one back to perfect health after she stuck her neck out where she shouldn’t have, ended up in a four-day coma, and then woke up unable to eat or drink on her own. I hand fed her green juice with raw honey several times a day until she could resume solid food – I won’t call it magic, but she’s good as new, now. And we vigilantly protect them from all the things that want to eat them – and that is an astonishing number of creatures.
I know that sounds like a lot, but on the vast majority of days, chickens are relatively easy to keep. And much to my initial amazement, they’re such funny little things. They can recognize up to 100 different faces – fellow chickens, other animals, and people, and they know who they like. In every group of babies I’ve had, there’s always at least one who likes to hop up on my shoulder, and there’s always another one who likes to be held. One stole an earring right out of my ear once; she spit it out, and my husband found it with a flashlight after dark, which was a much better outcome than I feared. They’re also really terrific gardeners if you need random holes dug, and they’ll definitely nap in your potted plants and steal your strawberry harvest, if you’re not looking.
The eggs, though – they’ll ruin you for anything you buy in the store or order in a diner. And you’ll definitely learn how to speak chicken, if you pay attention. If you get chickens, just know that you’ll then want some combination of goats, donkeys, horses, and cows, which will require you to move to a farm. You’ll end up feeding chickens in your bathrobe in the early morning light, you’ll learn that dirt washes off, and you’ll marvel that for something that weighs 3 or 4 pounds, they sure can put away the groceries.
Just never tell a chicken keeper that it must be nice to have “free” eggs – they might just hand you the poop shovel.
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