The Brutal Reality of the Simple Life

It's easy to forget about the darker side of living off the land. Most of us have idyllic images of juicy tomatoes, clucking chickens, and attractive red barns when we think of organic gardening, but sometimes things happen that remind us that good intentions are not enough to hide from mother nature's dark side.

Like a lot of rural households, we have a couple of dogs. My dad has a rat terrier named Chip, and my mom has a miniature dachshund named Sally. As you can see by the picture below, she's not a startling image of ferocity.

Despite many years of anthropomorphizing dogs as cuter and cuddlier versions of us; They descend from a long bloodline of killing machines. Otherwise, they never would've made it to where they have today. Sally is an uber affectionate, slightly dimwitted dog that is addicted to belly rubs, but she snuck out of the house the other day, and brutally mauled one of my chickens to death. I was pretty annoyed, but I can't blame her for it. Nature puts us in a position where we have to live off the death of other organisms. Which brings me to my next story.

Raccoons are a consistent menace to rural households. Every night they are trying to kill my chickens. They haven't been successful this year, but they've killed many of them in the past. In addition to harassing the chickens; They will eat every ear of my sweet corn if I let them, so I am forced to respond to nature with a little brutality of my own. My uncle Paul gave me a coon trap when I got the chickens, and told me I had to use it. I was really hesitant, because I'm not comfortable killing animals I'm not going to eat, but they are stealing food from me. I had to make a decision. Am I going to grow my corn to feed the raccoons, or do I want to eat it? I decided I wanted to eat it, so I set the trap with some doughnuts as bate. The first time I set it; There was a raccoon in there the next morning, and I had to shoot him in the head with a .22 at point blank range. I cannot emphasize enough that I took absolutely no pleasure in this chore. It pains me greatly that life is a constant struggle between various organisms trying to survive, but it does me no good to hide from this reality.

The purpose of this blog entry is to remind everyone that organic gardening and small scale agriculture are not as idyllic as we would all like it to be, and I apologize if the subject matter is a little harsh for some of you, but I want this blog to be a legitimate journal of both my successes and my struggles, so I think it's important not to misrepresent my summertime experiment as all pleasure and no pain. 

Two More Chickens

On Memorial Day, I went to the Marlette Stockyards, and picked up two more chickens. I was much happier with the selection this time. I immediately found two nice looking Isa Browns. According to the vendor, they're 11 months old, and have been laying regularly. I hope so, because I've been less than satisfied with the average production of the three hens I purchased a couple of weeks ago. My brood now consists of five hens and a mean little two-toed rooster. They've been averaging about an egg and a half a day. I finally got my first pale blue Aracauna egg after two and a half weeks.  The banty has been laying four or five a week, and the other hen has also been laying about four or five eggs a week. 

 

The Isas have been here about four days now, and I don't think they've laid any eggs yet, but they are such nice looking, well-adjusted birds that I'm expecting them to start laying pretty soon. Once the birds start producing up to their potential, I'd like to collect at least three eggs a day, but I'd be happy to get more. I know I have to be patient, because chickens can take a while to settle in after being transferred to a new location.  

 

Chickens

On Monday May 17, I went with Uncle Paul, Candy, and Gabe to the Marlette stockyards. My plan was to buy four mature laying hens. The selection wasn't as nice as I would have liked. One guy had a number of hens, but they looked pretty beat up. He said they just came from the Amish hatcheries, where they put them in with a lot of roosters to ensure fertile eggs. Anyone who's ever seen the rooster-hen relationship knows what a violent affair their intimacies are. I did buy two Aracauna hens from him for five dollars apiece. According to him, they are about a year old, which gives them about another two years of laying. I also bought one Plymouth Rock Bantam from some dude with no teeth. It's a pretty bird, but I wasn't really looking for banties, because their eggs are so small, but I got one for five dollars, and I'm happy with her.

Uncle Paul said he would give me a hen when we got back. When we were collecting her, I thought it looked suspiciously rooster-like, but I made the mistake of trusting my uncle, and taking her/him home. He is a little guy, but I'm pretty sure Uncle Paul knew he was a rooster, and I suppose he thinks he's pretty funny. I figured it out the first morning when he struggled to let out a few ugly crows. According to everyone, the chickens might take a few days to start laying, because the move stresses them out. I've already gotten two eggs out of my bantie, but I've yet to encounter one of those beautiful pale blue Aracauna eggs.

Week 2 To Do

To start my second week home I was greeted with a May 10 frost, but it did turn into a beautifully crisp spring day afterwords. For the rest of the week, it's going to be cold and damp until the weekend, when it's supposed to warm back up into the sixties, and possibly seventies by next week. Besides regular maintenance of checking on my seeds and plants, I've got a few special projects going this week. One that I'm excited about is trying to get my dad's bike back up and running with the help of the Bike Forums I think I figured out what tool I need, and the part to replace the broken freewheel. I ordered them from Amazon, so they should both be here this week. If I get it fixed, I'll describe it in a more detailed post.

I also started working on a three box system for the compost. Using the chicken coop as a backstop I've got three walls up, so it's kind of a 2 box system. I'd like to find one more board to use as a fourth wall, so we can stop using the garbage can altogether. I'm also going to be building a couple of tee-pee trellises for my pole beans to climb. I've located some long ash limbs. Now, I need to cut them and get them in place.

The chicken coop is looking a little abandoned, so I've got to start getting it ready. On Monday the 17, Uncle Paul and I are going to head to the stockyards, and pick up a few laying hens.
Work begets work, so I'm sure I'll discover a few more projects while working on those I've already got planned. To wrap this up on a positive note, I got my finally grades back, so I've officially got the 36 credits I need to graduate. I'm now a certified Master Librarian, or masterbrarian as I like to call myself.