Early Spring Surprises

A little madness in the Spring

Is wholesome even for the King.

--Emily Dickinson

Fawn sits . . . and sits . . .
and sits . . .

The week of Spring Equinox and Easter brought with it some lovely surprises to our farm--a couple of which seemed especially appropriate during this season of celebrating new life and new hope. First, one of our Buff Orpington hens "went broody"--that is, she decided she would sit on and care for a clutch of eggs. Of course, my daughters are excited to think they might soon be cuddling baby chicks again. There's a catch, though (as there often seems to be around here). Stripees, the only rooster that remains from the batch we got last spring, seems to be . . . well . . . how can I put this? Less that virile. It's not that he doesn't try to do his job, poor dear; he does--at least a few times a day. It's just that either his small size or his demure temperament (or both) means that after he's danced his flirtatious little jig around the hen he's out to snag and finally ascends those feathery feminine flanks to do his deed, he is more often than not promptly shaken off, and generally with little more than a vigorous shudder on the part of his erstwhile mate.

And so it is that the meek composure that has been key to Stripees' survival in our barnyard (he's the only one of the roosters from last spring's order of chicks that we decided to keep whose aggression didn't eventually land him in a cooking pot), is now leading us to question whether he is capable of passing on his genes to the next generation. If he isn't, then none of Fawn's precious eggs will hatch no matter how long she sits.

Knock, knock--anyone in
there??

To try to figure out whether this was the case, we "candled" a few of her eggs, but while I thought some of them seemed to hold some promise, I wasn't confident enough in my diagnostic expertise to be sure. So we were fortunate to once again be able to turn to a good-hearted neighbor, T. McLeod, at Bradford Farm Stores, who gave us a handful of his own fertilized eggs to set under Fawn just in case her own clutch wasn't going anywhere. So she's now covering a full dozen . . . and waiting . . . and waiting    . . . and waiting. She'll be there for the next three weeks, hardly moving from the spot except for just the briefest of potty breaks and quick bites to eat. And then--if the Spring Fairies are smiling on us--we will have babies on the farm again! Not that we really need more chickens. It's mad, really--wanting more baby chicks. But it's Spring! So come, little ones, and bring us new life.

Kokopelli

The most exciting--and perhaps most mad--thing that happened on our little farm last week, though, was the arrival of Segi and Simi's very own Easter Bunny. I had been working on this surprise for quite a while--plotting his arrival with a friend of mine whose family has owned him since he was

Cuddling with Koko
in his stall

a wee bun but now needs to get him off their hands. (Of course, I'm sure it is true that, as my husband helpfully pointed out, we don't need him any more than they do, but it's Spring! And in any case, he needs us.) I hadn't told the girls anything about him until a couple of days before Easter, when I announced that their Easter Surprise would be arriving a little early this year. That afternoon, my friend and her family rolled into our driveway with Kokopelli, his hutch perched on top of her SUV and all his supplies piled inside. The girls were ecstatic! As their father has insisted, we have him only on a trial basis, while the family is away on a two-week vacation. But of course, all of us girls have rapidly fallen in love with his snuggly-soft, twitchy-nosed little self, so we are all doing our best to make sure the trial goes smoothly.

In the meantime, we have used Koko's arrival as a particularly delightful learning opportunity. We have

Feeding Koko hay
in his hutch

acquired a great deal of knowledge in a very short time about the anatomy and behavior patterns of rabbits. Some of facts we have discovered have been particularly surprising. For example, did you know that many bunnies strongly dislike being held by humans? It makes perfect sense, of course. After all, they are relatively defenseless prey animals whose first instinct is to hide whenever a larger mammal is nearby. But I suppose most of us have been brainwashed by storybooks and children's television programming long enough that we just assume bunnies love nothing better than nestling in anthropomorphic arms. (What a funny ego our species our species has!) The girls and I have also accumulated a lot of tips on rabbit care. And we are learning a great deal about Koko's own particular personality traits, too. (I hope to share more of those in a later post.)

Koko has been learning some, too! Here he is at school with us:

Not bad for a first try, huh?

Great story! Can I have another?

Whew! All this studying is exhausting!

Next week, we are going to make part of our school curriculum studying the meanings and origins of Kokopelli's name and the Native American cultures from which it emerged. We think he'll be especially interested in this topic!

Until then, we will continue spending lots of time during these first few weeks of Spring doting on the newest member of our little farm family and looking after our latest mother-to-be. Welcome, Kokopelli, and good luck mother Fawn!

Eggs for Sale!

We finally have enough eggs to offer 2-3 dozen a week for sale. (We hope we'll have many more by this time next year, when the chicks we're expecting in May will be laying.) They are all brown but vary in shade and size. We are selling them for $3/dozen.

Here's a bit of information about the hens who lay our eggs: They all belong to heritage breeds, some of which populated our country's very first small homesteads. They spend most of their days free-ranging throughout our organically run farm (we don't use any herbicides or pesticides--ever). Their diets are supplemented by organic scratch and organic layer feed, both purchased locally. All this means that their eggs are significantly higher in folic acid, protein and Omega-3s than most grocery-store eggs. We have never medicated our chickens for anything, so their eggs don't contain any traces of antibiotics or other icky stuff.

So here's your chance to taste some happy-, healthy-, hippie-hen eggs! If you live somewhere in our vicinity and would like us to hold a dozen (or a half-dozen) for you, just let me know (at littlebentcreekfarm@gmail.com).

Our First Egg!

It finally happened! Queenie, the elder among our young chickens, laid her first egg. The girls had told me earlier in the day that they thought she was trying to lay--that she was sitting quietly in a corner of the coop and would peck at anyone who got too close. But we were all afraid to get our hopes up. And then there it was! Beautiful. Perfect. Light brown with the tiniest whitish speckles. An impressive specimen for a first-time layer. A small, everyday, awe-inspiring miracle.

Quennie's proud caregivers

Queenie leads the pack in more ways than one!

Chicken Chat

One of the most enjoyable parts of my daily routine is opening the barnyard gate soon after sunrise and being greeted by our colorful brood of heritage chickens racing toward me to beg for a scattering of scratch. Almost as delightful is sitting with them later in the pasture as they alternate between snuggling together and busying around in the leaves and dirt looking for bugs and other delicacies.

Before becoming interested in sustainable farming, I had never thought very much about chickens. They were not particularly exciting, not particularly complicated, not particularly lovable. They were just, you know, chickens. It is now hard to believe I ever felt that way about these fascinating, spunky, productive little wonders of the domesticated-animal world.

Here are some of the things I have learned about chickens just in short time we have been keeping our own.

• They are lovely. The feathers of the chickens in our brood are speckled white, black (with streaks of glossy blue), golden, and barred. And they wear them with grace and dignity as the strut about the barnyard.
• They are sociable. I have been surprised by just how gregarious and companionable our hens and rooster are. They spend all day together, chatting, cuddling, and occasionally pecking one another as they scratch around for food, lounge under the cedar tree and explore new areas of the pasture. They have even started socializing with the goats, often hanging out with them for much of the day in the goat stall. 
• They have distinct personalities. Who knew? They each truly seem to be their own chicken. Queenie (the Buff Orpington) is the matriarch, both bossy and protective; Zebra Zuzu (the Delaware) is gentle and sweet; Autumn (the Buff Rock) is feisty and independent; Crystal (the Splash Jersey Giant) is the quintessential team player; and Captain Haddock (a Dominique and the sole rooster) delicately balances submitting to his compatriots with asserting his male authority.
• They are fun. There are few things as entertaining as observing our nine arranging themselves on their perch in the evenings. Each time, night after night, they appear to passionately flirt, argue, repel, and persuade one another as they vie for position, and somehow always end up all cuddled together (except for Autumn, of course) on the same rung.
• They are endangered (more on this below).

Given the popularity of chicken meat and chicken eggs in our culture, how could I have known so little about these creatures before they became a part of my own household? Like most Americans, chickens have played a big role in my diet but had almost no place at all in my consciousness. According to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the U.S poultry industry is the world's largest producer, and Americans consume more poultry meat than either beef or pork. We also consume a lot of eggs: between 75 and 80 billion each year. You might think all this is good news for our chickens. I'm afraid not. The vast majority of chickens raised for meat and egg production in our country are raised in deplorable conditions. They are confined in tiny, filthy cages, drugged to grow so quickly and produce so many eggs that they commonly develop organ failure, cancer, and various types of deformities. Or they get infections that lead their owners to administer still more drugs. Some are so tightly packed in their cages that their beaks are cut off to keep them from cannibalizing each other. They never have a chance to peck at the ground, take a dust bath, or bathe in the sun. Or live anywhere close to their natural lifespan. (For more information on animals raised on factory farms, see www.humanesociety.org.)

It didn't used to be this way. Chickens have been around for ages and have been providing food for humans long before mass production came on the scene. According to scientists, the modern-day chicken is most likely descended from the Red Jungle Fowl that populated Southeast Asia around 3,000 years ago. The Greeks and the Romans may have been the first to domesticate chickens (for cock fighting, not meat or egg production). It is generally believed that chickens came to our own continent when Columbus brought them on his second voyage in 1493, though there is some evidence that they had already been introduced to native communities in South America by that time--most likely by Polynesians. Americans' interest in raising chickens skyrocketed in the nineteenth century, and for several generations chickens were a standard feature of the American household, an essential source of both food and income. They thrived in Florida where the weather was balmy; Minnesota, where it was frigid; and New Mexico, where it was arid. Sadly, it was their popularity and adaptability that eventually led to the near extinction of many backyard chicken breeds. As Jennifer Megyesi explains in her book The Joy of Keeping Chickens,
After World War II, the poultry business became industrialized, and improvements were made by crossbreeding to produce superior egg layers and meat birds. With the rise in commercial value for chickens, many breeds, now referred to as heritage breeds, were eliminated from flocks.

Unfortunately, the eggs and meat from industrialized birds are not nearly as healthy as those from chickens raised on small farms. (Free-range chickens contain 30% less saturated fat and 28% fewer calories than factory-farmed chickens; eggs from free-range chickens have 10% less fat, 40% more Vitamin A, and 400% more omega-3s.) And so most of us have spent most of our lives eating copious quantities of not particularly healthy eggs, legs, and breasts from miserably unhealthy chickens representing only a handful of hybridized breeds, while the rugged, diverse breeds of our ancestors have rapidly declined (and in some cases, disappeared). The heritage chicken movement wants to change this. It wants to bring chickens back to Americans' backyards and rescue the surviving chicken breeds that remain threatened with extinction. (Twenty-six of the 55 chicken breeds listed by the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy [ALBC] are identified as critical or threatened.)

On our own farm, we have several Dominiques (the oldest breed developed in the U.S., and listed as under watch), a Jersey Giant (also under watch), a Delaware (threatened), and a Plymouth Rock, an Orpington, and an Australorp (all recovering). So raising chickens for my family means not just providing healthy eggs and meat for our table, but also making a small contribution toward preserving the unique characteristics of some of the American farmyard's most long-time residents. As an added bonus, we are also providing ourselves with endless entertainment and endlessly charming companions!

For additional information on heritage chickens see:

• www.albc-usa.org (website of the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy)
• www.heritagepoultry.org (website of the Heritage Poultry Conservancy)
• Keeping Chickens: All You Need to Know to Care for a Happy, Healthy Flock, by Ashley English
• The Joy of Keeping Chickens: The Ultimate Guide to Raising Poultry for Fun or Profit, by Jennifer Megyesi and Geoff Hansen.