But I believe all com mentary can be hard-boiled down to one word: eggs. Department of Agriculture printed flyers saying, “Uncle Sam expects you to keep hens and raise chickens” during World War I?Īs alluded to earlier with the food scarcity comment, there are plenty of heady conjectures one could make. So why do chickens feel as popular now as when the U.S. What I’m saying is chicken-keeping may be cool, but it’s also work. ![]() Oh and that Sophie’s-choice moment when your hens pass prime laying age and you have to make an impossible decision between the chickens and the eggs? It’s rough stuff. (As of this writing, Garner had, herself, just lost a chicken in an event documented on social media.) So Hard To Say GoodbyeĮven with that, though, there’s still a decent chance you’ll say goodbye to a beloved hen before you’ve readied your heart. Keeping a flock safe from harm requires persistent, diligent attention. And it’s difficult to enjoy a night on the town when you know your chickens have gone to bed in an unsecured coop.Īlso, chickens are under constant threat of danger, whether from ailments such as bumblefoot and infectious bronchitis or the myriad predators that want to make a meal of your birds. By the 10th or so time, it can start to feel like a chore rather than an adventure.įree-ranging chickens can destroy the grass in your yard and dig treacherous holes for their dirt baths. There’s a lot of poop, for starters, and cleaning out even a small coop is a dusty and dirty affair. It’s a Labor of Loveīut there are some realities of chicken-keeping that aren’t completely acknowledged by that chicken coop photo shoot in actress/model Jennifer Garner’s Neutrogena commercial. More gardens and farmers markets, fewer corporate grocery stores sounds nice to my ears. With doom-and-gloom predictions of a food-scarce future creeping into the news, increasing our sustenance independence is a pretty good idea. ![]() I’m all for whatever softens people to the idea of growing food for themselves and their community. The idea of our family farm started out as a vegetable bed and four hens in a tight backyard. I think it’s great, down to the rooster-themed merchandise filling big-box department store shelves. And there are more how-to books about backyard chicken-keeping on bookshelves than a person could hope to read in a lifetime. No urban agrarian worth their salt would be caught dead without a plucky flock of hens these days. Sometimes when I scroll through my Facebook feed or peruse the bookstore aisles, I’m struck by just how popular chickens have become.
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