Chickens

There are chickens in my future.

I can't tell you how many, and I can't tell you when, but I can tell you that they are coming. Craftymama is wearing me down - slowly. It helps that I saw some chickens that I fell in love with. Is THIS not the most awesome chicken you have every seen. They are called Silkies. They  have black skin, come in array of colours, have 5 toes (instead of the usual 4) and lay about 3-4 eggs for week - so not very many. They are also very broody - which means they want to mother all the things. It's a weird chicken. I fell in love with how weird it is and looks. I made a deal that with Craftymama that I would consider allowing her to get chickens if there was at least one silkie in the mix somewhere. I wonder if I can train it to sit on my shoulder...


Craftymama wants to do them free range, literally, so they would have no fences or anything around them. Apparently chickens don't go that far from their coop because they get lost too easily. I am concerned for wild animals. We do live on 115acres. I am sure there is wildlife present that would just love a delicious meal of fresh chicken. I would hate to be constantly replacing them if they kept being eaten.

Then there is the problem of what we do with them after the age of like 4 when they stop laying. Chickens can live for quite some time I learned, and if they aren't laying, then you are just paying for a pet. So one has to determine if you want to keep them as a pet or not. If not, then what. The usual method is to kill them. Craftymama said she couldn't do it, I doubt glassman would, but I am of the belief that it's partly your responsibility if you own the chicken and have decided to kill it because it's of no use to you any longer than you should respect it and it's life enough to do it yourself. So, I think the task would fall to me. I'm not sure if I am up for that, it's something to think on.

Also, if we move we may have to take them with us, so there would be the issue of where to put them if we moved into the city. We lucked out with the awesome house and property we are on now, and I don't think we'll find something like this again, so the likelihood of having ample space for chickens in a new house is low. I'd like to stay in our house for the 6 months our lease is, and then if our landlord agrees to et us stay here longer, then get chickens. I'm concerned we will ave to move after 6 months and thus don't want to do anything too permanent.

Regardless, I feel at some point in the future craftymama will get her chickens that she has been asking for for about 3 years I think. I will get eggs, which I have been missing since summer when our CSA ended, and then, maybe, everyone will be happy.



Also - craftymama has been begging for goats.