I am a 25 year old San Francisco native who love animals, outdoors, dancing, drinking, artistic endeavors, and bizarre humor. I work a few hours a week so i may spend the rest of my time behaving like a six year old, and am lucky enough to have an amazing group of friends that support these efforts.
I also spend a large chunk of time planning a life that is self-sufficient and sustainable while living one that is not quite so impressive.
This is a chronicle of my attempts to get there.
Last summer after planting a few plastic pots with seeds for carrots, spinach, onions, and I can't even remember what the fourth veggie was, only the spinach actually grew into something edible. I had spent half the time freaking out, half the time zoning out, and some minuscule piece of time in between realizing my five second attention span was not suitable for a three month long project that required daily care. Granted, most of that care was basically walking outside and saying, "Yep, they're still there" and turning the hose on for a minute, but somehow I still managed to get distracted by shiny objects or whatever else seemed like a good idea that day.
How I've managed to not lose or kill one of my cats these past seven years is a personal miracle.
In any case, the spinach decided it that was going to ignore my lack of diligence and go ahead and grow anyway. A month and a half in, I danced around the yard with joy, so proud of my little handful of green leaves. Assuming I could just pick them any old haphazard way, I would walk outside in the morning and grab some to throw in a scrabble (made even better by the tomatoes and zucchini my father had grown successfully in his yard... not that I was jealous or anything) or sometimes head out in the afternoon to pick a few for a tiny salad. It was a short-lived victory, as I realized later I was harvesting it wrong and the Little Spinach Plant That Could finally decided Screw You, it didn't want to.
Crap.
But everything is a learning experience, right?
Which brings us to this year. The idea that I could grow my own food still buzzed in the back of my head. It's healthy. It's cheap. It's a Good Thing. All those friends and family who had gardens sharing their bounty of fresh fruits and vegetables. I could be one of those people! I love those people!
In a very backward and somehow more logical fashion, I decided to get chickens. Well, not decided as much as found myself in possession of said chickens. Like I said earlier, it seems almost miraculous that someone like myself who has trouble finding her keys on a day to day basis could support a life other than herself, but when it comes to animals, I can and do. I excel. I am a super hero. I am All Engines Go, and when my dad's friend had five chickens that needed a home far, far away from his new puppy, I jumped on the opportunity. I asked the roommates for their permission to add a flock of fowl to our underused yard space, and with a handful of apathetic approvals, some encouragement and dreams of fresh eggs, I dove into my new role as a "chicken owner" with the cautiously attached subtitle "urban farmer."
They joined the household in March, and I named them after The Golden Girls.
Backyard Chickens became my favorite website. I printed a list of chicken treats to hang on the fridge. I decided five was a lot to start with and gave two of the birds to my cousin, who lived outside of the city and already had an established coop, leaving our house with Dorothy, Blanche, and Sophia (appropriately named, as she was well past her laying years). We settled into a new pattern and for a while, everything was peachy. The eggs were amazing, with deep orange yolks, and everyone wanted some. We got through several crazy stormy days, which the coop and chickens survived without incident. I was having fun watching them destroy the weeds in the yard, allowing the dogs follow them around but never chase. The cats decided they did not like birds bigger than themselves and continued to sleep their days away in the garage.
Then a new idea popped into my head. A dark, not so nice idea.
It started as a joke, really. Sophia wasn't laying and if I were really to be an urban farmer, well, what do you do with chickens that don't lay anymore? As much as I adore animals, I do eat meat and find it hypocritical to ignore the life that was sacrificed. I read
Farm City by
Novella Carpenter. I thought about the emotional stress of killing and eating something I loved, but also how many chickens I had eaten in the past that did not have the freedom to run around a yard like mine all day, getting treats like yogurt and grapes. I reread Farm City and joked some more, but the jokes turned to discussions, and the discussions turned into plans.
Then, on a sunny day, we decided it was time. I will not revisit this more than necessary; there was an audience, both for support and assistance, and I spent roughly half the time crying or screaming. It only became easier once "she" became "it", cleaned and cooked, next to a store bought chicken that was easily double her size. When it came time for dinner, the sad truth came out; the chicken we had "harvested" was a tough old bird with no business on the table. Out of courtesy, and probably a bit of guilt, we all tried a piece before giving the majority to the dogs. To be honest, I felt like I had failed. I felt guilty, frustrated and in over my head. But hell, that never stopped me before.
Until, a month later, Dorothy got sick.
Crap.
Once again, I felt like a jerk. How did I not noticed she wasn't feeling well? Was I not cut out to be a chicken owner, something that seemed so easy before? One day she was pecking and scratching, the next, laying down in the coop not wanting to move. Freaking out and not knowing how to proceed, I rushed her to a vet. Although the place I took her did not usually take chickens, one of the vets had his own flock; he told me the hard truth that she wasn't well off, but even beginning to figure out what the problem was would mean tests and money. The vet consoled me by letting me know chickens usually hide their illnesses, and in Dorothy's case, the most humane choice was to let go. I said my goodbye and headed home with better information on keeping tabs on chicken health.
I spent the next week trying to figure out what my relationship with these animals truly was. While I was upset at myself for ending Sophia's life and for Dorothy getting sick, I was also unable to pay upwards of fifty bucks to take them in every time I thought something might be wrong, especially if the end result is having them put down. In the end, I resolved that as long as their lives were as healthy and happy as I could make them, and their deaths humane, I would do my best to not take every issue as a personal failure. It was still a learning experience; I watched Blanche closely and emailed the vet a few times, and when it was apparent she was healthy but lonely, I made the move to get her some new flock mates.
I checked Craigslist constantly. Eventually I found what seemed like a good match, three two-month old Easter Eggers that were just about ready to move into a coop. A friend and I made the trip to Petaluma, stopping for a picnic on the way back. As we sat on the grass and pushed pieces of butter lettuce into the cat carrier, they would spaz out as if something was trying to kill them, only to freak out
even more when they realized it was food. Several times I found myself wondering if it was healthy for such small creatures to be so worked up for an extended amount of time, but luckily everyone was in one piece still when we arrived home.
Introductions were interesting. Blanche had gone from shy to needy without her flock and seemed genuinely happy to have company, but also realized she was easily double their size and took advantage of it, though never seemed to peck too hard, which was a relief. I fretted the first week but have grown comfortable with our new flock and their high pitched chirps during treat time and to be fair, most other times as well.
We tried to not name the little ones, but as their personality shows more and more it has become hard not to identify them as individuals. A handful of us have started to decorate the yard and restart the vegetable garden, requiring the chickens be contained to a chicken run to protect the plants. One of the many learning experiences I'm sure we'll continue to have while we pursue a slightly greener, more productive yard/lifestyle.
Which brings us almost completely up to date.
Crap.
