I'd call it: Hen Pecked

what chickens dream of

Painted Boots is set in rural Wyoming and all through writing it I've felt inspired to embrace my rural roots.  So tonight my daughter and I attended a class on raising chickens.  I think chickens are cool birds and I love the natural color of chicken eggs -- they range from sand to sage to blue.  Unless the chickens get into the grapes.  Then they're purple.

We have an old playhouse I want to turn into a chicken-coop and I'll admit.  I thought I had it all worked out.  But now I might have to wait until I'm basically home for the rest of my life.  Because chickens, as it turns out, are a lot of work.

For the first eight weeks of their existence they need a temperature-controlled environment that starts at about 100 degrees and decreases by about 10 degrees per week.  The nesting beneath their feet should be changed every day.  They need to be kept indoors.  They are at risk of 'poopy butt' if you don't feed them millet and even if you do.  You must wash said poopy butt, as it can become quite miserable for said baby chick.

Then, once they grow older and are past the poopy butt stage, the little rascals need supervised time out in the yard to exercise and get acquainted.  But if one of them gets hurt and starts to bleed it is at risk of being pecked to death by its friends because chickens go crazy when they see the color red.  This does not explain why chickens with natural red markings are not pecked to death, but you can forget letting the little beasts wander through your garden eating bugs because if you have strawberries or tomatoes, well, you won't have strawberries or tomatoes for long.  Chickens, BTW, are carnivores.  If said chickens see a rat or mouse or snake they kill it and eat it.

These birds seem to have kept a lot of their ancestral dinosaur-ish traits.

Then there are the production issues.  Twelve chickens can lay about 90 eggs a week, so for an average household you want maybe three or four chickens, max.  And get this: as long as you don't wash the eggs and keep them cool they'll be good to eat for up to TWO YEARS.  That would be a brave meal, non?  Chickens crave protein-- bugs, small rodents and ewww.  They are cannibals.  Chickens will eat chicken meat.

But for the moment let's say you want to remain at the top of the food chain and eat your pet after it stops laying eggs (they only lay for about 2 years).  The meat will seem a bit tough, as the grocery store chicken we're all used to was butchered at around six weeks.  Those chickens were improperly fed and marginally cared for to 'plump' them up through water gain but that's another issue all together.

So we might not be getting chickens come spring but hey!  I feel inspired to learn how to be an herbivore.