Eating Locally....Just a Cluck Away?

Winter eggs...pale pink, green and ivory

Chickens. Should we or shouldn’t we?  One neighbor keeps pet ducks in what we call the Falling Down Highly Aromatic Duck Condo.  Other neighbors down the road kept a rooster, but they had a flimsy 2-foot-tall chicken wire fence around its pen and a coyote soon made quick work of it. No more 5 a.m. wakeup calls from that yard. 

A cat that clucks? 

We toured the poultry barn at the Sandwich, Illinois, county fair two years ago, marveling at the fluffy-furry look of the ribboned champs--they were positively catlike.  We have flipped through the chicken-covered pages of McMurray’s, a specialty catalog that offers everything you could possibly need for raising fowl.


To harvest those warm eggs on a summer morning, or prepare all those egg-enriched baked goods, or ponder over our ability to become truly self-sufficient, green, sustainable, and maybe even artistic--knitting a sweater or making some jewelry circa 1975 and incorporating those plentiful chicken feathers...these are the things that entice.

But back to reality...do we need really need eggs every day and how many can we possibly use?  Do we have time for two-legged outdoor “pets?”  Will we look “trendy?”  I hope not.  

There was a time in Chicago when butchers had live poultry that they slaughtered on the spot for customers.  Now, according to every fashionably "green" magazine, Web site, book and newspaper, it's time for every city and suburban gardener to acquire a chicken. Or three. 

So, if we get a few chickens,  will I have to give them names?  And what about salmonella? I’ll never make a raw-egg dish without worrying that someone will fall ill. But then there’s all that potential chicken manure we could use. Maybe we’d be better off with another wacky Golden Retriever.  

My friend Lou tends chickens, a pot-belly pig and other critters on her farmette northwest of Chicago, along with a very large organic vegetable garden and extensive flower gardens. That’s when she’s not working at her 40-plus hour job in information technology, in addition to her grueling commute. Her potatoes--fingerlings, heirlooms and others--grow like weeds in a mix of composted pig manure and hay.  She occasionally bring to work cartons of eggs from her free-range chickens. During winter when egg-laying slows down, her hens produce a few eggs in the most delicate pastels--pale pink, taupe and mint green.  

Hawks or coyotes have occasionally picked off a chicken here or there on Lou’s property, but for the most part, the chickens amble around her garden in summer, pecking at bugs and plants, seemingly happy.  For now, I think we will stick with this chicken, one which stood guarding the flowers in my mum’s former Chicago garden for many years.   

Thinking about chickens?  Check out the rare breeds and supplies at  McMurray’s Hatchery catalog. 

Already have chickens?  Do tell--post a comment or email me at info@thisgardencooks.com