The Ladies and The Reluctant Urban Rooster

My wife is now the queen of her own backyard coop.  We have become part of the urban chicken movement in New England.  Honestly it was a quick decision more than likely based on two of our three children leaving the roost and going off the college than the desire for sustainable agriculture in our backyard.  After admiring the flock kept by a neighbor two streets over she said “I want some chickens.” 

After 26 years of marriage I knew that meant I needed to jump into action.  After some internet research I decided I would build a “chicken tractor” which most of you know is portable chicken coop ideal for moving around the yard.  Our goal was to make the coop without spending too much money, otherwise the idea of eggs produced by the 5-6 chickens we planned to keep for the purpose of supplying us was not a sound financial decision.  I set upon an old child’s redwood play structure in our backyard which was not of any use to our children.  It provided all the wood needed.  I searched the net for a design to copy.  Multiple websites and several You Tube videos later I had the chicken tractor designed and built.  I had even managed to enlist a child’s scooter for wheels and an old kitchen cabinet for the door of the living structure.  The only item that I needed to purchased was the appropriate wire for the outside of the coop.  We were now ready for the LADIES, as my wife has come to call them.

My wife, daughter, and I decided to find someone in our local area that had chickens available.  We decided to get chickens that were already 8-10 weeks old and able to be outside in a coop without additional temperature concerns.  We knew that a New England winter would come 12 short weeks after they joined us and we wanted to make sure we had success.

After purchasing 6 Ladies of various breeds I cannot recall, a few books and periodicals, feed, a feeder, a watering apparatus, and the wire for the coop, we were now into the project for about $110.   After my wife and daughter named chickens Dumpling, Bubbles, Sprinkles, Tater Tot they turned to me and told me to name two of them.  Without hesitation, I named them for something I loved about chickens, Fajita and Enchilada.  My wife changed their names to Rita and Spicy because she felt I was putting a little too much pressure on them to perform.

A chicken tractor at the time seemed like the best choice for our back yard.  We move the tractor every week which I have found prevents the grass from being completely decimated by the chickens in the coop.   My wife, a degreed horticulturalist, assures me that come this spring the chicken poop will be excellent fertilizer and the Ladies will eliminate any lawn pest problem we may have had.   I wonder how grass can grow when all that is left is dirt when the Ladies are done but I will pass my judgment next spring. 

We were told that the chickens could begin laying sometime between 20 and 24 weeks.  After 22 weeks I was circling the coop with warm flour tortillas and Texas Pete buffalo sauce threatening their existence if they did not soon provide us with our required bounty. 

On a crisp morning on the first day of winter it was my chore to clean out the coop.  The chickens make an amazing and aromatic mixture of hay and chicken poop that my wife has me pile neatly in a mulch pile for use next spring.  Out of the corner of my eye I spotted a light green oval object.  I was a little skeptical since at 21 weeks my wife had placed a couple golf balls in the coop to encourage the Ladies to lay eggs.  This would either trick them into thinking the balls were actually eggs as an example or she was letting them know that I had a set of clubs and was willing to use them.   I had come running in with the two golf balls a week earlier telling of my joy at being the first to find two eggs.  I knew we had amazing chickens since one was able to lay an egg with Titleist printed on it and the other with my company’s logo!  Indeed, this day, I had found our first real egg.  I told my wife one of the Ladies had tried to engrave something on it as a peace offering to me, but she assured me it was just a random chicken poop design. 

We took pictures of it and sent it to all our family from California to Texas as if our chickens were the first ever to manage laying eggs.  My father in law has also added a new coop which he has yet to stock with chickens because he was worried about their laying in the winter, he lives in Waco, TX.   I guess the chickens in Texas don’t have feathers.

We are now getting 4-6 eggs a day from our Ladies during some very cold winter days.  We found that we have to gather them early so they do not get damaged, we gather them quickly when we let the Ladies out of their coop.

Chicken knowledge is what one gains every day the Ladies are in our back yard.  The eggs have been wonderful.  I was a little unhappy when my wife had me purchase a dozen store eggs so she could keep the carton to put our eggs into.  This took our $110 investment to $112.29.  I did not add in the box of Cheerios she uses as treats.

Well, after a couple dozen eggs some of our investment has been recovered, but I have now decided to consider the chickens a hobby rather than a money saving venture, which is fine considering the smile they put on my wife’s face and the joy they bring her each day as she shares her anthropomorphic stories about the Ladies.  “Rita was irritated with me today.”  She will say and I will reply “How do you know?”  “I can tell by the expression on her face.”  No offense but I have stared at the chickens trying to get some sort of facial response and have yet to see a change of expression.

A chicken truism I have learned; No matter how carefully you walk in the chicken coop, you will step in chicken poop.