Doing the last rounds on the old farm, saying farewell to chickens and goats. Here, a bunch of the girls (goats) are chomping away on hay, and the eight cockerels are enjoying a day in the cold sun. They seem to be getting on well, there used to be usually one low guy running a little scared, but since they’ve been kept in for a bunch of supercold days, all has apparently been worked out and they stick togther now. Of course, who knows what’s going on in the chicken mind?! The goodbye is not any formal thing—a little ceremony, perhaps?!—just something in my head. Ends and beginnings are weird, before and after we can make as much or as little of ’em as we like, but the actual fact happens in a blink. It looks like I’ll do the big main farming move on Sunday. The farm sale doesn’t close for a couple of months, so I’ll be back here in March (hey, that’s only next month already!) for the greenhouse and to dig up some herb transplants. Meanwhile, I’ve given Bob the chickens (the girls are laying away, the guys, well, they’re past their tender meat-bird prime…and looking good), so they’re be well taken care of. And I’m looking around these last days with slightly new eyes at the familiar stuff I’ll be leaving… :)
Actually, those ‘guys’ are perfectly good eating – in soup at least.
Ohhh you are making me sad…I could say goodbye to my house, my cars, my stuff, but I don’t think I could leave the land or the animals. Well maybe the camel…but he’s ornery! Good luck with the move, Kim
What does go on in the mind of a chicken? One could ponder this forever and yet, we will sadly, never know. However, do you think if our animals spoke to us, we’d like them as much????
Mike, good luck at the new farm. I have become a regular on your blog since finding it in January.
Let me know when to pick up some of your ‘guys’. Wouldn’t wanna miss out, you know. If you’re interested I can cook one up for you as a token of appreciation :-). You’ll be amazed.
Bob M: I edited to the post to be less harsh on toughened-up meat birds!
Kim: Don’t be sad, in this case, at least, the moving on is good. The animals are in able hands, and the land goes on with or without us. Home is where the heart is, and the growing must go on! :)
Carrie: Um, if our animals spoke, I can only imagine the debates and negotiations we’d get into. Like, imagine arguing with 25 chickens all at once about whether it was OK for them to eat their own eggs? It’d be awfully distracting. I think things are OK as they are now… But it would be kinda cool…
Bart: That sounds good. I like being amazed. Actually, I have eaten properly cooked toughened up chicken, tastes great! The timing on these guys was just off, we were going to kill them on the farm a few months ago, but then things got crazily distracting…and they still live!