No longer a spring chicken

By Christine Tailer
HCP columnist 

I used to be a chicken farmer, of sorts. Twenty-five feathered girls would rush to peck at the grain I scattered around my feet. I felt so loved and important. Black and orange, gray and brown, white and speckled, they were my adoring flock.

People who don't know chickens might not understand chicken loving. Some chickens are gentle, and will snuggle deep into your arms for a good long petting. Others are skittish and squawk and sputter no matter how tenderly held, but they still come running for treats, and they all have the uncanny ability to cock their heads and look you in the eye as if to impart their chickenness deep into your soul. You look back as though you understand, but that is only pretense. People, even doting chicken farmers, cannot really know what it means to be part of their flock.

There is the lead hen, who is always the first to head into the coop each evening. She settles down on her perch in the middle of the row. One by one the others hens make their way inside, sometimes entering only to leave again, but in time they each hop, with a rustle of wings, up to their designated roosting place. Should one settle down in an improper position, a ruckus will ensue until the proper order is once again established. Such is the way of chickens.

Twenty-five hens and I began the new year together. By early spring, they were all laying up a storm. There were eggs taking over my refrigerator. I had eggs in baskets across every kitchen counter. There seemed to be no escape from eggs, and even though I gave eggs away everywhere I went, I still had an impossible number of eggs.

Then the mother fox came around. The first day I saw her, I thought how beautiful she looked. The next morning, I changed my mind. Three piles of feathers were strewn across the spring grass. Their white and orange colors stood out boldly against the new green grass. No more free range for the girls, at least until the fox pups had grown and their momma was no longer hunting to feed them. I kept the flock locked safe inside their run, unless I was working in the yard to keep close watch over them. In time, with no new fox sightings, I let them range again.

It was early summer when one evening I noticed a momma raccoon with several little ones nearby. Such a cute little family they were. The babies were small enough that they could squeeze through the run's fencing and dine on the spilt chicken grains. I watched. The babies did not bother the hens at all.

Then one morning I awoke to the sound of wild squawking coming from the coop. Five hens lay still in the run. White, black, gray, orange and speckled. The baby raccoons had gotten into the run, but must have grown overnight, and could not get back out. They were dining on a fine chicken breakfast. It took both Greg and me to chase and prod the now big babies out of the run through the gate. Right before my very eyes, the cute little raccoons turned into alien monsters. With each prod of my stick, they hissed and snarled looking more like demonic creatures from a horror movie than cute baby raccoons.

Weeks passed and all seemed to be calm in chicken world once again. Then I woke one morning to find several still hens pulled up against the run's wire. The raccoons had dug their way under the fencing and pulled my birds to the fence and then tried to pull them through. I lined the entire length of the run with creek rocks and cement blocks left over from other projects. I sighed with the hope that my chickens were now safe from the raccoons. They could no longer fit through the fencing or dig their way under.

I was thankfully still able to gather enough eggs for Greg and me and have some left over to give away to family and friends. All seemed well, until the weasels came along. I was so sad. Only five hens now survived, and they were clearly traumatized. They did not lay. They cowered in the coop. I held them and cried. It felt so odd to gather eggs from yesterday's chickens.

I messaged a chicken keeping friend. He said he would gladly re-home my five survivors and that I would be welcome to stop by and pick up a dozen eggs whenever I might want throughout the year.

I dried my eyes. Greg and I are certainly older than we were when we began our creek valley adventure. Perhaps the fox, raccoon and weasel were simply reminding us to begin to slow down. Twenty years of being a chicken farmer, of sorts, have now come to an end. My daily chores will no longer take quite as long. 

I will be able to linger a bit longer with the pigeons, rabbits, goats, sheep, cattle and horses. I will move a chicken step slower. I will cock my head and think back on the girls who taught me that there is no love like chicken love, a lesson I will never forget. I suppose, one might say, that I am no longer a spring chicken.

Christine Tailer is an attorney and former city dweller who moved several years ago, with her husband, Greg, to an off-grid farm in south-central Ohio. Visit them on the web at straightcreekvalleyfarm.com.