It's one of those rare days when I have no place I need to go, no one I need to see. This seems to becoming a rare occurrence for me and as such, I hold it precious. I heard a woman yesterday in line to check out at TJ Maxx talking to another woman and I don't know what she was talking about, specifically, but she said, "It's good. It makes me get out of the house and I tend to just stay at home too much."
Hmmmm. I knew what she meant.
There's a dichotomy for some of us. We long to be at home but we know our lives are enriched and made more luscious and interesting if we get out, get away, do with and for others.
But today is just mine, although of course there is much here which needs my attention. I would love nothing more than to curl up with the book I'm reading right now and spend my day in bed with it, snoozing and reading as the day passes. A day like that will never happen unless I am too sick to get up, though. My grandfather's genes are too strong within me to allow myself that sort of rest, although in theory, I think it's a good idea and probably healthy too, now and then.
But that's not what I came here to talk about. No. I came to talk about chickens. For those of you who do not know me, I have one rooster and eight hens. There is another hen which hangs out with mine and she has a nest in my husband's garage and so she is sort of ours but she came over from the flock next door and so I do not really think of her as ours, although we take whatever eggs she gives us and we make sure she has food and water. I named her Carol because she used to be feral and would run from us when she saw us but now she runs toward us, wanting to be fed, and will even take food from my hand on occasion. Here she is:
She's a pretty little thing and lays nice big eggs and our rooster, knowing quality sister-wife material when he sees it, courts her assiduously. I have seen him push food away from one of his hens so that she can get it and she does seem to like to be by his side at times. Elvis is a courtly rooster, although violent in his mating.My chickens live in a pretty little coop with an attached hen house which my husband built where they roost at night (Carol does not roost with the others- she roosts in a tree) and I try to keep it tidy and fairly clean. I put hay down so that when it comes time to clean it, I can rake up the hay and carry it off to the garden where it sits and composts and then I lay down fresh hay for them. I'm not obsessive about it, but I try to at least muck out the hen house regularly because they poop a lot and it's a small space and it is where they lay their eggs.
Most days I let my chickens run the yard and they love that and I love watching them as they do it. They are busy, those chickens with a comic sort of dignity, scratching and pecking and they have been good for the flower beds, despite my fears that they would tear them up. They have not. They have kept them weeded and fertilized and it is a constant delight to see them in a different part of the yard, scratching in this bed or that, beneath this tree or another. There is just something about my chickens which makes my soul happy. They all have names, of course, and we've raised them from babies and they are no more afraid of us than we are of them and they live quite peacefully with a cat and the squirrels and the birds although I think a large predator bird got one of my hens and I know that snakes visit the hen house and eat my eggs. I have found them there, although not lately. I did find the shed skin of one the other day, laying across a bale of hay at the back of the hen house.
Well. That's country life. And I am so grateful to live here in Jefferson County where no one thinks twice about a yard full of chickens.
My neighbors have chickens too, but theirs is another story. They not only have chickens but also goats and a donkey and a horse and guinea hens and a turkey and dogs and hell, I don't even know what all. They have a LOT of animals and in fact, most of their back yard is taken up in animal pens and I've always enjoyed the proximity of all these creatures and so do the children who come and visit and yes, the adults do too.
But in the past few months, it would seem that they have developed a sort of obsession with adding more and more chickens to their yard. I know they can't begin to eat all the eggs they get. I can't keep up with mine, even with the snakes' taking some. I think it's more of well, like I said, an obsession. They have begun collecting chickens, it would seem, and some of them are fancy breeds and some of them are not but there are suddenly just way too many chickens, in my opinion, in a very small space which unhappily borders my property.
To me, the joy of backyard chickens is that of seeing them running and doing all the funny chicken things they do and mostly, being happy. And okay, spoiled. I give my chickens their regular chicken feed and corn scratch and I crush their shells up and give them back to them and I give them fruit and kitchen scraps and whatever stale bread products we have and neighbors bring over their treats for them and Lily, my daughter, even gives me her stale food and too-gone produce to give to them. And they get that daily run-time and they can scratch and make dirt baths and nap under the shed and just do what chickens naturally do, rewarding me with their beautiful eggs of many colors and their clucks and crows and cackles and even, I think, a sort of affection. It's a beautiful thing.
It is the opposite of factory-farm raised chickens and if you've ever driven past one of those places you know how evil they are. The smell alone is wicked and I'm not one of those people who cries over the rights of farm animals but dammit- there's just something so very, very wrong about those places and that's all there is to it.
And it seems to me that my neighbor's chicken yard is growing a little too much like one of those nasty places. They don't put hay down for their chickens and so there is no way to scoop up the poop easily and we've gotten so much rain that the dirt they have to run in is always wet with rain water and thick with feces and there is no dry sand for them to bathe in (which is something healthy chickens need) and sometimes it seems as if there isn't enough food for them and the smell is growing more and more intense. Intensely awful. I never minded the smell of the animals over there before. It was just a nice, barnyard smell but there's nothing nice about it now.
I've seen dead chickens in the pen recently and that can't be a good sign.
I went over there today to take a picture (breathing through my mouth) and although I saw no dead chickens, it wasn't a happy sight.
That's just a few of them in a very small space.They never get anything green to eat and if a bug made it into that pen, it would be gone in an eye-blink. And I don't think my neighbors are cruel or neglectful. Not really. I think they've just suddenly found themselves in the position of having more chickens than they literally know what to do with.
Mr. Moon and I have discussed this. Should we say anything? How do you do that? We don't have that many neighbors here and it's really not a good idea to alienate any of them. How do you say, "Your chicken pen stinks up my whole yard," without sounding, uh, bitchy? And critical. But it's getting extremely unpleasant and frankly, it makes me sad to see the chickens in these living conditions.
I don't know. The upside of living in a place like this is that you CAN have chickens but the downside is that no one checks to make sure that the animals people keep are healthy, much less happy. I don't think I could bring myself to report them to the local authorities. They would KNOW it's me and besides, the animals do get fed and watered and well, there's that old song, "Ain't nobody's business if I do," which is sort of the motto for people who live in rural areas.
Well, I guess it's like anything else. You take care of what you have the best you can and if someone asks for your opinion you can give it and you have to get along to get along and so forth.
But that's what I'm thinking about today as I go about my chores. I started cleaning out my chicken pen yesterday when a storm chased me in and lightening and thunder cracked the sky and my old house rattled and shook but I finished the job this morning and gave my beloveds some watermelon and cherries and corn and made sure that Carol got some too.
It makes me feel good to lay down that unpooped-upon hay and it makes me happy to see the chickens cluster around the melon, which is one of their favorite foods.
I'm doing laundry and a little housecleaning and I took a good walk and so I'm feeling as if I am taking care of business here on my side of the fence and all of that makes me feel good, to tell you the truth. It's a hot, slow day and I can be as slow as I want to; I can take a break and write this. I'll let the chickens out in a little while. I'm trying to get them to lay me their eggs where I can find them again and have already collected three today. They'd rather be outside but right now, they seem content with their fresh hay and treats and clean water.I'm letting the world at large take care of its own business and I am taking care of mine and if you want to know the truth, that's plenty for me. For today, at least. The older I get, the more I realize that the world does not need me in order to keep spinning. And that is a beautiful thing.
Although it's good to get out of the house now and then. I know that too. And I wish my neighbors would at least enlarge the area their chickens have to live in. I do.
But it's not mine to deal with and I am remembering that. And I have a feeling that it will be resolved one way or another. Even without my interference, even without my help.
Happy Friday, y'all.
Love....Ms. Moon
