empty
Rambling Farmhouse is no longer home to any farm animals.
Rehoming the chickens is something I had been pondering for a while. I've been nervous about the challenges that accompany early spring every year. As the local raccoons, opossums, and foxes are having babies before the wild food supply is plentiful, they prey on the birds, so dispatching trapped predator becomes a daily chore. The sort of chore which I have little stomach for. Meanwhile this winter, our eggs have been selling well via the refrigerator at Bluebird Farm, so when Rachel asked if I might be willing to sell some of the chickens, I offered her the whole flock.
I know that leaving chicken husbandry was a good decision, but carrying that decision out was difficult nonetheless. Chickens are stupid and dirty, but they are also beautiful and funny individuals, and nothing is better than eggs collected just that day. I won't miss arguing with the children about whose turn it is to do the chores, and I won't miss doing battle with Lucifer the Fiercest Rooster, but I will miss their noise and their popping up in unexpected places when I work outside.
This evening, we crated the chickens and took them to join the flock at Bluebird, where our good friend Henry will take excellent care of them. Then I came home, threw myself on the bed, and sobbed.
I wasn't really crying about the chickens.
Keeping chickens (and later turkeys and ducks) was Adam's project. At first, he had to work hard to convince me that this was a good idea, but once they were here, I enjoyed them at least as much as they pissed me off, usually more. In getting rid of them, I am one step closer to being able to put Rambling Farmhouse on the market, one step closer to finding the life that belongs to me and not to us, one step further away from the vision that was my guide for so long.
Of all of the spaces I have cleaned out since Adam died, though, the chicken coop is the first one for which I don't have a new purpose. There it stands at the top of the sledding hill.
Empty.
Rehoming the chickens is something I had been pondering for a while. I've been nervous about the challenges that accompany early spring every year. As the local raccoons, opossums, and foxes are having babies before the wild food supply is plentiful, they prey on the birds, so dispatching trapped predator becomes a daily chore. The sort of chore which I have little stomach for. Meanwhile this winter, our eggs have been selling well via the refrigerator at Bluebird Farm, so when Rachel asked if I might be willing to sell some of the chickens, I offered her the whole flock.
I know that leaving chicken husbandry was a good decision, but carrying that decision out was difficult nonetheless. Chickens are stupid and dirty, but they are also beautiful and funny individuals, and nothing is better than eggs collected just that day. I won't miss arguing with the children about whose turn it is to do the chores, and I won't miss doing battle with Lucifer the Fiercest Rooster, but I will miss their noise and their popping up in unexpected places when I work outside.
This evening, we crated the chickens and took them to join the flock at Bluebird, where our good friend Henry will take excellent care of them. Then I came home, threw myself on the bed, and sobbed.
I wasn't really crying about the chickens.
Keeping chickens (and later turkeys and ducks) was Adam's project. At first, he had to work hard to convince me that this was a good idea, but once they were here, I enjoyed them at least as much as they pissed me off, usually more. In getting rid of them, I am one step closer to being able to put Rambling Farmhouse on the market, one step closer to finding the life that belongs to me and not to us, one step further away from the vision that was my guide for so long.
Of all of the spaces I have cleaned out since Adam died, though, the chicken coop is the first one for which I don't have a new purpose. There it stands at the top of the sledding hill.
Empty.
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