Keep Chickens!: Tending Small Flocks in Cities, Suburbs and Other Small Spaces (5 page)

Chickens are natural partners in a complete home recycling program. Since I’ve had chickens, no leftover fruits, vegetables, or breads go to waste. Instead, the Girls get it all, which delights them from the tops of their rough combs to the tips of their sharp toes. Besides, all those lovely, fibrous scraps just make them poop more, which gives me more guano to go in the compost bin. Feeding kitchen scraps and leftovers to a flock of city chickens is a win-win event.

Your chickens will gladly take over pest patrol in your garden.

Chicken manure is a potent fertilizer.

Chickens are beautiful. Chickens are fun. Chickens are also a bit rambunctious. Left to run unattended in your garden, gentle hens take on the demeanor of roadhouse thugs. They break blossoms. They crush tender shoots. They pull up baby lettuce and lay siege to unsuspecting squash seedlings. They don’t mean to; they’re just a band of happy, clumsy hens.

When I first started keeping chickens, I’d let them out of their coop and into my garden. I’d watch them a bit, then go back into the house. Two hours later, I’d go back outside and wonder where my garden went. Left behind was a landscape of freshly dug and scattered soil, several shallow holes, and rootballs and rhizomes laid bare, vulnerable and drying up on the sunny topsoil. While I appreciated how thoroughly the chickens had aerated my garden, I was disappointed not to have any plant life remaining that could have benefited from their efforts.

I quickly realized that my hens became hoodlums when left unpenned and unattended. Still, I wanted to enjoy watching them browse through my garden on occasion without sacrificing years of nurtured foliage. I wanted them to keep eating all those delicious bugs, too, so I came up with a couple of ideas.

The first part of the plan was to limit the time the Girls had to themselves in the garden. Instead of letting them out for hours at a time, I let them romp freely for about a half hour before dusk. With a limited amount of time, the Girls can crush only so much in the garden. I don’t take any chances with delicate plants like bleeding heart and maidenhair ferns and delicious greens like baby lettuce. I have a large yellow push broom and a wide orange rake that, happily for me, seem to strike fear in the hearts of the Girls, even when the tools are simply propped against a fence. I place the broom and rake across beds that are off limits. The hens, certain that these tools are instruments of chicken torture, tend to steer clear.

As a second part of the plan, I let the Girls out only at dusk. Part of the reason they dig holes so frenetically is to cool themselves; the earth below the sun-warmed topsoil is cool and soothing. At sundown, they aren’t as likely to dig holes for their cooling comfort, because the warmest part of the day is already gone.

I allow the Girls long, leisurely hours in the yard when I’m gardening. This way, if I catch them digging near ferns or flowers unguarded by Bad Broom and Rake of Death, I can promptly shoo them away. Anyway, hanging out in the garden with my chickens is fun for me and for them. The Girls like to think they are helping me if they are directly underfoot. If I’m turning soil in spring, they crowd around like kids at an ice cream counter, waiting for me to turn up fresh, juicy worms. When I prune or trim plants and shrubs, the Girls like to stand by the pile and taste the tossed clippings. They’ll sneak up behind me, grab a twig from the debris, and run off with it as if hoarding valuable treasure.

More recently, my spouse came up with a great idea for allowing the Girls out in the yard without close supervision: a temporary fence. Think “baby gate” for chickens. It is made of heavy-duty netting that is 3 feet (90 cm) high and spooled like a bolt of fabric. One end is secured to a post near the fence in my yard, and the other end is stapled to a sturdy wood dowel that extends about 8 inches (20 cm) below the bottom of the net. I’ve sunk a PVC pipe in the ground at a point across the yard from the fence post. Before letting the Girls out of their coop, I roll the net across the yard and drop the end of the dowel into the open mouth of the PVC pipe. This divides my garden into two sections — mine and the hens’. The system is somewhat primitive, but it effectively seals off half of the yard from my cheerfully marauding chickens. You could also construct fencing with wooden dowels at either end and sink PVC pipes in several strategic locations so that you could fence off different portions of the yard.

The Girls maintain total rule on the narrower front portion of the temporarily fenced area just outside their coop. The rest of the yard belongs to me. In the front section, I coincidentally had plants that were resilient to heavy hen feet: established rhododendron, azalea, arborvitae, camellia, raspberry, mint, and other evergreen, woody shrubs (miniature conifers look adorable with chickens mingled among them). None of these plants has ever sustained much wear and tear during the chickens’ pleasant pillaging. The larger back section behind the net fencing has all my delicate plants, including the ferns, peonies, and vegetables.

Poultry Tribune,
circa 1940.

Yet another benefit of having a garden flock of chickens is being able to enjoy their beauty. That’s right, their
beauty
. Considering the great variety of plumage colors, patterns, and styles, I think chickens are the most beautiful birds in the fowl world.

This temporary, lightweight, portable chicken fence can be made for a minimal cost with items purchased at a local hardware store.

Unfortunately, the beauty of chickens has been eclipsed by their unglamorous and historically utilitarian role as meat and egg suppliers. A chicken’s many colors and pleasing symmetry are generally overlooked by a chicken-deprived public. Keeping small flocks of colorful hens in the garden is like celebrating a live art form, with egg dividends daily.

Over the years, I’ve seen and read about many different breeds of chickens. While I really do love getting fresh eggs, I didn’t pick the Girls solely for their egg-laying reputations. I picked them for their looks. I like them
big
. The bigger, the better. Being of petite stature, I seem naturally drawn to big things: big cars, big dinners, big rooms, big coffee mugs, and, of course, big chickens. Not that I don’t appreciate the smaller bantam breeds. There’s nothing quite as elegant as a snow white Silkie or a regal, fancy-tailed Japanese, two of the few true bantam breeds. But for me, the sight of an 8-pound Australorp hen heaving her broad breasts toward me during her rendition of “running” is both impressive and amusing. See
chapter 6
for more detailed information on selecting the right breed of chicken for your urban coop.

I also love the Girls’ beautiful plumage: a dark red-orange Rhode Island Red; a jet-black Australorp whose feathers shimmer with green hues in the sunlight; and a black-and-white, herringbone-patterned Barred Plymouth Rock. Their bright colors are vivid against my thick, rarely mowed lawn and contrast nicely with the paint on their henhouse — a bright yellow and blue, with royal purple trim. When the Girls are walking slowly, as they usually do, their pleasantly plump bodies float across the lawn like big, colorful koi in a pond.

As for stress reduction and relaxation, backyard koi ponds and bubbling fountains have nothing on a flock of urban chickens. After a stressful day at the office, nothing makes me feel better than heading out into the backyard, sitting down in a lawn chair on the patio, and watching the Girls stretch their scaly gams. Gazing blankly at my pets peacefully clucking around on the lawn takes my stress down several notches and always gets me laughing.

The Girls love when I talk to them; during their babyhood, I spoke to them often so they’d become comfortable around me. The tiny Girls would fall asleep in my cupped hands while I spoke quietly to them. Listening to hours of my chick-happy monologues while growing up accustomed the Girls to my voice. As full-grown hens, they still enjoy my voice — sometimes too much. One evening I let the Girls out behind their coop, an area beneath my dining room window. I opened the window and started talking to them, and they happily cooed and scratched below. Except for Zsa Zsa. She suddenly jumped up at the window. She hovered briefly near the sill, flapping madly, before clumsily fluttering back down to the ground, grounded again. Perhaps she missed me and wanted to catch a glimpse. Or (more likely) she thought I was holding a fresh cob of corn and wanted to beat the other Girls to it.

Fresh egg yolks are dark yellow or bright orange because backyard chickens (unlike their commercial cousins) eat lots of greens and vegetables that contain beta-carotene.

While chickens are not wired for affection and loyalty in the same manner as a cat or dog, they are friendly and loving in their own way. They don’t cuddle with me on the sofa in front of the television, but the Girls do show me chicken-style love. If nothing else, I am their favorite walking food dispenser. When the Girls hear my approach — chickens have great hearing and sight, but not great senses of taste and smell — they all run to the coop door. Their clucking picks up pace as they jostle each other out of the way for a better view of me. Well, I like to think it’s me; they probably just have their eyes set on the lawn or any food goodies in my hand. When I open the coop door, they spill out like ecstatic concertgoers, each barreling her way to the front of the line on their rush to the lawn. If I’m in the coop and bending down to tend to chicken stuff, Zsa Zsa will jump up onto my shoulder and pull at my hair. Or she’ll peck at my jeans or untie my shoelaces when I stand still for a bit. Lucy and Whoopee aren’t as cuddly, but they do like to hang out close to me, even when they have the entire yard available to them. Again, I won’t flatter myself — they probably just don’t want to miss any potential edible handouts — but I enjoy their company just the same.

My friends, my spouse, and I have learned that watching chickens in the yard will bring a smile to anyone’s face. What’s so darn funny about them? Here are a few brief tales of the Girls’ escapades. However, I recommend that you watch and laugh at your own chickens. Chicken humor, like most comedy, is a highly subjective experience.