Free Bird

This was our fourth flock of chickens. The first three were all victims of needing to move, to make the yard less smelly and appealing to the next buyer of our home, to conform to what everyone expected of a house and yard in an urban setting. Each found a new home with other chickens and various farm animals.

This time we had a permanent home where first pigeons and then chickens were raised for decades, which had fallen into disuse. We took out the old house, rebuilt the fences and started looking for appropriate free items to fit into a full size Jenga game of a chicken house. First came an old work table, perfect for the base. The an armoire with drawers at the bottom, which served a dual purpose of storage and doors for the back of the hen house. Some fence boards, a free window and a few metal corrugated roof pieces later, and it was a house for the ages.

The chicks went from being fuzzy little things falling asleep in their food to scraggly looking teenagers losing their down and trying to feather out. And then it was time to meet their home. They figured it out in short order, and those soft clucking sounds were once again part of our being, providing a soothing background to time in the garden. The girls, as everyone calls their flock, would run waddle up to the fence to greet us when we went to the garden, looking for leafy greens or scraps, always ready for a handful of scratch.

The eggs were big, beautiful and tasty. You gave them food and water, cleaned out the hen house, and breakfast materialized in the nesting boxes. It was like magic.

We lost one to a predator and a couple more to whatever causes chickens to kick the bucket. We raised three more chicks, one of which turned out to be a rooster and was re-homed, and decided not to add more chicks to the flock. Some others went to poultry heaven on their own time, as chickens are apt to do.

And then there were three.

Chickens are social animals. They will flock together for protection from predators and find comfort in roosting next to each other, helping to keep the coop warm at night during cold weather. When a predator is spotted, one chicken will provide a call of warning to alert the others, and they all run for higher ground. Chickens can get lonely if they live in isolation.

We didn't want to wait until we only had two birds to find them a new home, so the decision was made. Cindy listed them on Craigslist this time, since I still have scars from my previous experience. In short order someone around the corner from us said they wanted our girls to meet their girls (and a duck who thought it was a chicken).

 

After seven years of cohabitation and interaction with Gladys and Eleanor, and about five with MacHenna, we boxed them up individually, put them on a cart and headed down the driveway. They took to their new digs and were walking among the other chickens (and duck) when we left. Despite having a much lighter load, the walk home was slow going

I cleaned out the coop yesterday, distributing pine shavings and chicken poop under the avocado tree, as I usually do. This time no chickens will scratch and help turn it into the ground from where it once originated. It was quiet in the garden and there was time to mull over the experience. People come and go in our lives, as do poultry, and we learn how to navigate the waters, plotting a course that may take us not where we wanted to go, but where we needed to go.