I have so many stories to tell because my baby chicks hatched today, but Thursdays are heavy work days, which means I have to wait until tomorrow. I just had to show you these beautiful eggs. It’s egg season right now, and my 6’4″ teen son is in heaven. This is what he ate for breakfast…plus coffee and a bowl of yogurt and blueberries.
Then he ate two more eggs for a snack.
Hopefully, that’s all for today. The girls are laying very well though, so we have plenty. I love this time of year. I feel so rich. I even saw Betty Jr., who is 7 years old, laying an egg today. How is that possible?
Oh yeah, Rooster is her father. He has really good genes.
We are in the transition period around here. I have many stories to tell but am only just now feeling well enough to write very much. I think I mentioned the week before last that my son was really sick. Of course, I caught it, and it was a rough one. I don’t think I have been this sick since COVID. But I am so happy to report that I am doing better, and today, for the first time, I was able to do some real work around the homestead.
I did a deep clean on the duck house, even the windows, which I am sure will be completely dirty again when I let them out in the morning, but I tried. I also worked on raking up the straw from around their house and around their food–and at the little warm spot under the dryer vent at the back of the house where the ducks like to hang out every winter. It was so snowy this winter that we put down a lot of straw for the ducks, and now, we have layers of straw to gather and compost. I didn’t get it all finished, but I made good progress. Next weekend I will try to finish that task.
I always wished for a barn for those ducks in the winter, but I don’t think we are ever getting a barn for them. The ducks will be seven years old this year, and I can see that we probably don’t have too many more years with them. In fact, the other night, when I went to give the ducks their peas, I couldn’t find Anna Maria. I was so worried because we have had the owls hanging out again. Hopefully, they are getting the rats, but I worried they maybe got Anna Maria. I found her though, and I knew there was trouble because she let me pick her up.
I brought her into the house to study her and couldn’t find anything wrong until I got to her vent. She had a soft-shelled egg stuck, only it wasn’t that soft. That poor baby! I held her, and Ron very gently got it out. She’s doing fine now, but this is not a good sign. The ducks are laying more soft-shelled eggs than proper eggs right now, so I had to research.
And it’s not easy to research this because it is rare to find anyone who has had Indian Runner ducks this long. In all of the forums I have ever been in, it’s rare anyone has a duck more than three years. Usually, the ducks are killed by predators, but Boudica and I work together to keep those ducks as safe as possible.
Anyway, all I could find was one Reddit thread where a woman asked about ducks in old age laying soft eggs. Only two people responded. One person said, to keep the ducks alive, they would need birth control, that laying eggs as their bodies are failing will kill them. This is devastating to me, but I looked up the birth control, and it’s about $300 per duck. That’s not possible, so I am going to hope and pray they just stop trying to lay. However, I did read that one thing you can do is supplement their diet with Vitamin D. I always thought soft-shelled eggs came from lack of calcium, which made no sense to me because they have a high calcium food. Interestingly, according to what I read, as the ducks age, their bodies stop processing Vitamin D very well, so they need extra. I hope that’s true because I started adding a vitamin mix to their water that has a lot of Vitamin D.
Please cross your fingers for little Anna Maria and Luna and Anna Sophie, our cello-loving duck.
Ron has been busy all week building a brood box for the turkeys. Turkeys! That’s right, I have an incubator full of chicken eggs, and now I have an incubator full of turkey eggs. I’m terrified I am going to mess this up, as I have never hatched turkeys, but I’ll write more about that later.
Mainly, I have to tell you about the brood box. Ron is a person who, if he is going to do something, it is going to be magnificent. You should see the grape arbor he built last year. A tornado could come through here, and that thing will stand. It’s also beautiful because he also has to make things beautiful. It’s the poet in him, I think. The brood box is a masterpiece, and it’s giant. I think, if I can get the eggs to hatch, the babies will do well there.
Ron has also planted some seeds, so it’s all upon us. It’s the transition time, and there is so much to do. It’s a bad time to get sick for sure, but I am thankful to be getting better.
I also have one more little side note that I thought would surely make you smile.
I wrote before about how I try to bring different treats every night for dinner to our rescued deer mouse, Jeremiah, and his friend and roommate, Cynthia. Well, lately, Jeremiah doesn’t want anything different. He only wants pecans. I know he’s stashing them though, so last night, I told him there would be no pecans. I made homemade popcorn because it’s Cynthia’s favorite. Jeremiah likes it too, but he was sad because there were no pecans. I started with the popcorn, and he took it at first but then dropped it. He looked back at me. I had some fresh blueberries, so I gave him a blueberry next. It’s from the grocery store, so he only eats those when there’s nothing better, I guess, so he wouldn’t even take that.
“That’s all there is tonight,” I told him. He looked around at my hands, and I went on about my business of trying to pet Cynthia. Jeremiah gets the “zoomies” at night, so there’s no catching him to pet him.
Anyway, I talked to Cynthia a bit and then looked over to see that Jeremiah had a pecan in his mouth. I knew he had a stash! I guess he was saving them in case I failed to show up with them at some point. He is well prepared I guess.
I hope we are all as good at preparing as Jeremiah. It seems like an important skill to have right now.
Last week, for the first time in five years, I cleaned up the nice incubator and prepared it for hatching eggs. Last fall, the meat chickens we ordered came with some kind of respiratory illness. I do knot know if they had it from the hatchery or picked up something along the way, but some very sick chickens arrived last fall. We lost 11 of 26, and I think the only reason the rest survived was because of my experience with respiratory illnesses in chickens and Ron’s ability to remove and cull quickly. It was a nightmare for sure.
And, to add to the stress of all of it, we had to worry about our main flock getting the sickness. We had to wash constantly and never let anything that touched the sick chickens touch anything that would go to our main flock. And keeping Ruby away from the baby chicks was an extra challenge because you know how she is.
Thankfully, we succeeded in keeping our flock from getting sick, but the whole experience led to some deep thinking about ordering chicks from the hatchery moving forward. I am sure getting sick chicks in the mail is overall quite rare, but with the state of things and our deep connection to our flock, we decided to not risk ordering live chicks this year and just order hatching eggs.
This means my incubator skills from years ago will come in quite handy–only I’m nervous I don’t have the skills I used to. Still, I am going into this experience with a lot of wisdom learned from my broody hen mamas, so I wanted to share instructions for hatching chicks from hatching eggs with notes from my observations of what a broody hen does to ensure a successful hatch. After all, Mother Nature knows best, so if I can copy her, I surely will.
And I have to add that, so far, so good because I candled the eggs on Saturday, and out of 36 hatching eggs, we had just one that wasn’t developing. It’s early, but I am hopeful for good numbers.
Instructions for Hatching Chicken Eggs (with broody hen notes)
Choose a Good Incubator
The first step is to choose a good incubator. You want to choose an incubator that measure temperature and humidity, and I highly recommend one with an automatic turner. Good visibility and easy cleaning are perks, and one thing I learned from experience is that, if you live in a colder climate and want to start incubating in the spring when it might still be chilly outside, a styrofoam incubator holds the temperature better. I haven’t researched incubators in a long time, but read for real reviews and consider your price range. We have a Hova Bator, and I have had good success with it. I had a plastic shell incubator first, and it did pretty well as well; however, I had to add heat on the outside to help ensure the temperature stayed proper on the inside.
Choose a Good Space
I learned from my broody hens that a good space can make a big difference in success rates for hatching. You want to choose a space for your incubator that is out of the way and dark. I cleaned out a closet for ours because I want to make sure the eggs stay in the dark. After all, under a broody hen, it’s warm and dark.
Prepare Your Incubator
Even if your incubator is new, you will want to clean it. It’s best to not use harsh chemicals because fragile little babies are going to be born in that incubator. I use vinegar and water to wipe down any parts I cannot submerge in water, and I then I submerge and scrub any parts that can be submerged, like the flooring. Again, no harsh chemicals, just some vinegar and water.
After you have your incubator cleaned and dried, it’s time to set it up and test it out for a day or so to make sure it can maintain the temperature and humidity you want. You will add water to the water reservoirs, turn on the incubator, and then start monitoring things. You want to ensure consistent temperature and see how much water you need to add to ensure consistent humidity. You also want to make sure the turner works.
A broody hen is magically consistent. She sits for 21 days, only leaving for some periodic bathroom breaks. I keep food and water near our broody hens, so she can have easy access to nourishment. And I always hear the turning of eggs at night. I am sure she probably turns eggs during the day too, but in the quiet of night, it’s so cool to hear a broody hen in there turning her eggs with such care. You definitely want to make sure your incubator is consistent like a broody hen.
Temperature and Humidity Level
Temperature: 99.5 degrees if your incubator has an air circulator, 101-102 degrees if your incubator has still air
Humidity: 45-55% until lockdown on Day 18 (I have seen varying thoughts on humidity, but this is a good range for our incubator that circulates the air.)
Humidity: 60-70% for lockdown from Day 18 to Day 21 (You have to work pretty hard in the last few days to keep that humidity up, but it’s important to prevent the membrane from sticking to the chick during hatching.)
Schedule
When your incubator is ready, and your temperature and humidity are at proper levels, it’s time to start. You should not wash the fertilized eggs, but you can dust off any messy bits. I tend to avoid really dirty eggs just because. The whole journey will take a total of 21 days, but I have had eggs hatch as late as day 24. I also had a broody hen who ended up with a very cold egg in the middle of a process stay on that egg and hatch that baby at day 29! We still have that baby chick. She’s all grown up and will be four years old this summer.
After Day 7, you can candle the eggs. If the chick is developing, you will see blood vessels or a dark spot forming in the egg. To candle the egg, simply hold up a flashlight to the egg. If the egg has a dark shell, you will have to get into a really dark room and hold the flashlight up to the egg and then study hard. If you see just a clear egg and a yolk that just moves around freely, you know that one isn’t going to develop and should be removed to prevent it from rotting and exploding. If you are unsure and think you might see some development, leave the egg in the incubator for now and candle again after waiting several more days.
I used to stress out about candling and try to hurry so fast, worried that somehow being out of the incubator a few minutes would be harmful. I even accidentally broke an egg in my rush before. After seeing that a broody mama can leave her eggs for up to an hour and everything will be just fine, I no longer rush. Take your time and be careful with the eggs when you candle.
On Day 18, it’s time for lockdown. First, you will remove the eggs from the incubator and candle them again. Be careful that you have a good, safe places for holding and candling the eggs. Of course, remove any eggs that stopped developing. At this point, the egg should be full. You can sometimes see little feathers, which is just so cool.
While the eggs are out of the incubator, remove the turner. The eggs will stay still for the last three days. When a broody hen gets to Day 18, she stops leaving the nest. She will not even eat or drink, so I take them water. They won’t eat much though because they know they can’t leave. For the last days, the heat and humidity needs to be steady.
After you remove the turner, you may want to put down some shelf paper to help the chicks have traction when they hatch. I have not done this before, but I read about it and plan to do it this time. I read it can help prevent splay leg.
Be sure to keep the humidity up during lockdown! This is so important!
At this time, you should also get your brooder ready for the babies with food, water, and a heat source. (That will be a different post.)
By Day 20, you will likely start to see some pips in the eggs, but don’t panic if you do not. If all is well, most the eggs will hatch on Day 21, but you should definitely give them a few extra days. Hopefully, you will have a successful hatch.
After the Hatch
First of all, just like a mama hen, you are going to be so excited when those babies start hatching. When they first hatch, they look rough. They are wet and tired from all of that work unzipping an egg. They are also really wobbly. But the wobbly won’t last long. Soon, they will fluff out and get their legs under them.
Once they are completely fluffed, you can move them to the brooder. Definitely let them get good and fluffy before you remove them, and wait until you have at least two or three ready before they go to the brooder. If you put one in the brooder alone, that baby will cry itself to death. That may be an exaggeration, but I can see the possibility. Chickens are social right from the get go.
I have to admit that, after seeing the way a mama hen and a baby chick look at each other, I always feel sorry for the chicks that I hatch. I am a terrible mama replacement. Just terrible. But I do my best, and the chicks have each other, which helps. Plus, when you are the mama hen, you definitely get to know the chicks better.
If you are thinking about trying incubating eggs for the first time and have questions, please do not hesitate to leave a question. I hope these notes helpful, and I hope you get to see this very soon!
I am working on a longer post because I am incubating eggs and want to write about that, but I have not had much time to write this week. I have a sick kiddo, and I have been busy organizing canning jars, seeing what I have and what I need. I think, maybe, after six years of having to buy canning jars a little more at a time every year, I have all the jars I need this year! It’s a good feeling to be well prepared for the coming garden season and to not have to spend any more money.
But I had to give a quick Kate update. This is a picture to I took of her yesterday. This was the second time she had decided to back into the coop that day, but you can see it in her face, right? You can see that she wasn’t going to stay there.
She has taken to flying over to where the ducks are, just like Poe used to do. She wants to go see what the ducks are doing I suppose. Our ducks are old and grumpy, but I don’t think they will hurt her. I also think Kate is too agile to get caught by the ducks.
I am taking a break from work to tell this story about Kate, affectionately known as Kate-Kate. Kate is our little Easter Egger mix, part Schubert and part Rooster, and full of personality. She is the one, when she was little, who kept going over to the other mama hen’s crate, which stressed her mama out and stressed me out. Even after I put up a barrier, that sassy little girl would take her tiny little chicken nugget self all the way around the barrier. She was like four days old doing this! I had never and have never since seen anything like it.
Kate is so curious and very independent. .
I was worried about her a bit this winter. It was a long winter with a lot of snow. She was in the coop for weeks and weeks, and I could tell it didn’t sit well with her. She had a look in her eyes that really worried me, but thankfully, despite second winter rearing its head this week, it’s spring. Kate is out of the coop and running around, even though I am trying to get her to stop. I have thought about clipping her wings to keep her out of the driveway and in the chicken area, but since we have had not a single report of bird flu in our area yet and Kate is really good at dodging the mail trucks, I’m just letting her run around the driveway for now.
But she’s difficult because she’s Kate.
So this is what happens: I won’t let her out of the front door of the coop in the morning when I am doing food and water, so she goes around the coop to the side gate and flies over herself. But then, for whatever reason, maybe she has to lay an egg or may she just changed her mind, she stands at the front door of the coop wanting to be let back in. I do not know why she doesn’t just fly back over, but she doesn’t. So, all day long, I am taking breaks from my work and looking out the window to see what Kate is up to. Most of the time, she’s there wanting back in the coop. I ask her why she can’t make up her mind, but my sense from her is that this is exactly what her mind wants.
This process has happened five times of this just today. In fact, I had to go let her in the coop in the middle of writing this post. She walks in without even a “thank you,” just like, “of course you’re going to wait on me.”
On time today, Faure took the opportunity to sneak out when I had the door open for Kate. She was so sassy out there. She meandered over to where the other chickens could see her, and she scratched in the grass like she was so special. The other hens watched in envy. Dvorak watched with worry. He hates when his girls are on the other side of the fence and can’t be protected, and Faure is definitely his girl. They were raised together and are very close.
The cutest thing happened later though. I looked out the window to see Faure freaking out and pacing at the coop door. She is a big girl and cannot fly, so her only chance to get back in the coop is if I let her in. I ran out there because she absolutely looked like she was about to lay an egg. It’s like a pacing when you really have to go the bathroom.
She ran in that coop and went straight for a nest box! It was all fantastic!
It made me think about how much I love getting to spend my days back and forth with these amazing animals. I have been looking for jobs recently, and I realized today that, for some of the jobs, I wouldn’t be able to work from home. I would miss all this. I would miss Kate and Faure and Ruby and all of her antics. It made me decide I had better keep looking for online work. I mean, I’ll do what I have to do, but I sure would like to keep watching my chickens. I am spoiled, I know, but who else is going to tell these chicken stories?
With that in mind, if you are a long-time reader and would consider supporting this blog and the journal on Patreon, I would be grateful. I am planning to hold events for members, so I hope you will consider it if you can. If you have supported in the past but took a break, I hope you will check out the Patreon page again because we now have a $3 a month membership. If you cannot afford it right now, that’s totally understandable. Just leaving a comment of support is really good too.
A photo of the mill from my visit to The Lost Kitchen last December
“If you don’t have good ingredients, you can’t make good food.” ~Erin French
Erin French has inspired me so much as a home cook. I have always subscribed to the philosophy that, if you have really good ingredients, you need to let them speak for themselves when you cook. Erin French takes this to a whole other level, to an art form, and her work has inspired many meals and treats on our little homestead in Maine.
And, because I feel it’s so important right now to support our Maine farmers, I spent a few weeks over the winter watching every episode of The Lost Kitchen in order to have a list of the farms Erin uses to create her amazing dishes. Then, I realized I should share this list with readers.
If you are in Maine or visiting Maine, please check out this list. I have included links to every farm and shop mentioned in her episodes. In some cases, farms did not have a website but did have a social media page, so I have linked to that instead. I did my very best to make this list comprehensive.
If you are not in Maine or visiting Maine, I encourage you to find farms in your state and support them as much as you can. Buying direct from farmers at their stands, at farmer’s markets, or from their online stores makes a huge difference to farmers.
Strawberries *No location given, but Erin picks fresh strawberries. U-pick is a summer tradition in Maine. Check out Real Maine for a list of U-Pick locations for strawberries.
Season 2, Episode 3
Raspberries Pottery Farm, Thordike, Maine *Also focuses on wood-fired pottery
*For more information on where to pick fresh raspberries throughout Maine, see this list from pickyourown.org.
Organic Beef (grass-fed and finished on apples) Apple Bottom Beef, Jackson, Maine
Blueberries Erin picks blueberries on a small farm. Picking blueberries is a big Maine tradition. You can find a farm with high bush blueberries at Real Maine.
I have been buried for weeks in the work of this, and I am so proud. In between the chickens and the children and the cooking and the working, I managed to get this latest issue of the journal completed. It is the most beautiful issue I have ever created, and I hope you love it. Please check it out. I believe it will be good for the soul!
I cannot believe it has been a whole week since I have written in the blog, but I have been very busy with work and the chickens and being a cello mom, and in all the nooks and crannies where I can normally squeeze in time to write, I have been building the upcoming issue of Farmer-ish journal. Friends, I can’t wait for you to see–and hear it!
We are adding audio to this issue, and it’s beautiful. I have done some of the reading, but most of the authors read their works themselves. I have cried more than once hearing the authors speak the lovely words they wrote. I can’t wait to share it with you all.
I am thankful I have been able to put this together. I mean, I’m not finished yet, but it will be ready by Friday for sure.
I am knocking on wood as I write those words.
It has been a really, really tough week here in so many ways. I won’t write about it because I know so many people are having their own rough weeks right now, but I have to tell you the things I am grateful for today because it’s Tuesday.
I am so grateful the snow is melting, and you know how is the most grateful of all? The ducks!
They all made it through the winter, and though no one is laying an egg yet, they are getting wild and rowdy and having a blast in all of the water. Little Anna Maria is still struggling with her blindness but doing okay overall. It’s always a little hard on her when the snow melts and the flock is out and about more. She has a hard time finding them, so I am back to checking on her several times a day, chasing her down, carrying her to her people, only to be hissed at by our male duck, Ferdinand. I emphasize I am trying to help. I think at least Anna Maria is grateful for my efforts.
I am also grateful tonight that my daughter got a new and better job, that my brother continues to heal, and that it won’t be long before the rhubarb is growing. We are completely out of jam and jelly right now. That hasn’t happened in years. I did not make nearly enough last summer, and both my husband and son went on a peanut butter and jelly kick this winter.
Did you know I do not like peanut butter? I have, thus far, never met a single person who doesn’t like peanut better. If you do not, I would love to hear about it.
I do have to add one sad note: Hector is in her last days. I spent way too much time today snuggling her. I was going to make her a basket and let her sit in the sun today, but she leaned into my chest, which meant I worked to build pages of the journal in slow motion today with a chicken in my lap.
I am so grateful for that time with her though. I kind of want to go get her and snuggle her some more tonight, but she got tired of sitting still after a few hours. I took her to the coop, and she went to a nest box. She’s not walking too well, so I was impressed.
I was making dinner tonight when Ron did the nighttime chicken chores, so I had him check on Hector. He said she was in a really, really deep sleep. Hopefully, she will pass tonight in her sleep. She got a full 10 months longer than I thought she might. Gosh, she’s.a great bird.
It’s almost spring. The old birds who have held on all winter will start to let go.
It has been such a long, cold winter that we are running low on firewood. This makes my teen son who runs quite hot quite happy. However, the cats and I are chilly in the evenings, and we all miss the fire in the wood stove. Thankfully, we are starting to see a melt, and it feels like Spring is, truly, just around the corner. It is also nice that the kitties hang out with me in the evenings now instead of in front of or underneath the wood stove. My lap is now the warmest spot.
I am teaching a rhetoric class right now, and one of my students wrote about how she sends emails to her co-workers every single Wednesday to tell them how grateful she is for them. This resonated with me on so many levels. First, I have been trying very hard to convince my mother of late that people will help you more if you treat them kindly. She is resistant to this idea, but I don’t think it’s wrong. It’s true that there will be some who will just take advantage, but by and large, my kindness to others has resulted in a great deal of happiness and support in my life. I think my student is wise, rhetorically speaking, to send gratitude emails.
But there’s also just the goodness for goodness’s sake–that overwhelming feeling of good when you have helped someone or done some good in the world. It’s so real. Just yesterday, my son and I experienced this. He was driving us home from his cello lessons (he recently got his learner’s permit), and there was a person with a sign asking for money. We have been trying so hard to save every penny of late that we haven’t been helping others like we would normally. This has impacted me mentally quite a bit. I like to be as generous as possible, but I also understand that hard times are upon us.
I have not had cash in my wallet in quite some time, but by some miracle, I actually had some cash. It was a $20.
I hesitated. “That’s a lot of money right now,” I said.
“Please,” my son said. “I’ll pay you back.”
So I handed him the money, and he handed it to the man.
The man was so grateful. We watched as he packed up his bag. It was enough that he could be done for the day, it seemed.
“Being giving made me feel better. I feel better than I’ve felt in a long time,” my son said. “If you ever get lucky and win at capitalism, you share, share, share,” I said. “You’ll be a happier human for it.”
The story reminded me of how helping others really just helps you. I don’t tell that story to make it seem like we are so great because we are not. I have been so worried about the state of things that I haven’t been very generous to the world at all in recent months. But I am grateful I had that $20. It led to a good conversation with my son about the joy of being helpful to others and how we can’t lose that in tough times. And, truly, it felt so good to be helpful.
With that in mind, I am grateful the hens are laying now. Before I start selling eggs I plan to give a few dozen away because eggs are such a precious gift right now. I mean, they always were to me, but I think, right now, those beautiful eggs might lift some spirits. I took one dozen to my neighbor, and she paid with a hug. I was grateful.
I am also grateful that the snow is melting, that my son and I are gaining in health and strength, that Boudica is able to go on short walks again, and that my brother, who has been very ill, is in recovery after a liver and kidney transplant. We talk on the phone at least twice a week now, and I am so thankful for his conversation. He is so curious about our farming, and I tell him everything I can about the chickens, ducks, and what all we do around here. He lives far away, but he said he had a dream he was with us at our house working in the garden wearing a straw hat and that it was all wonderful.
I am grateful for the community I have been able to make around Farmer-ish. The journal is coming back online on the Spring Equinox, and I can’t wait to share it with you. And I am grateful to have a community to share it with. Thank you for reading and supporting in all the ways.
Every Tuesday, I am going to try to write about the things I am grateful for. We need good things. We need love and kindness and gratitude. How else can we combat the darkness, right?
I would love for you to join in. Are there things you are feeling grateful for right now?
To the many of you who have followed Mary Jane’s story over the last nearly 8 years, I wanted to let you know that she passed the night before last. I found her in the coop yesterday morning, and my heart is broken, of course.
The night before, we had been out pretty late because our son had a performance in Portland. When we got home, I went out to close up the chickens and put away the food and found that Mary Jane was not in her usual spot. I went to her and touched her. She got up and was moving slowly, but she went to the food dish and started eating and eating. I thought this was unusual.
I went about doing everything else for the evening chores–closing up the ducks, dumping waters, busting ice, etc.–and came back and told her I was going to have to take away the food dish because it was bed time. Because she was so old and so wise, she understood a lot of language and understood I had to take the bowl. I gave her some pets and kept the flashlight on, so she could make her way over to her usual spot in the coop. She was moving so very slowly heading to her spot, but she has slow been all winter. At some point, I just quit worrying about her quite so much. I think I just thought she might live forever.
I said good night to her and told her she was a good girl. I wish I would have hugged her, though she was only sometimes in the mood for hugs. I keep thinking about seeing her slowly making her way in the coop in the light of the flashlight. That’s the last time I got to see her. I wish I would have said more, but I know in my bones she knew I loved her. I made it clear so, so many times.
When I went to the coop yesterday morning, she was in her spot and had passed sometime during the night. The flock wasn’t acting weird at all, as they sometimes will when someone dies in the coop, and Mary Jane just looked like she passed in her sleep. She looked peaceful. I think it must have been a quiet death, as the flock was not disturbed until later when I was holding her and crying. .
I held her for the longest time and angry cried a lot, though I do not know why I was angry–other than I am just angry at the world, I guess.
When I went to get Ron and let him know, Boudica found me. She had heard me crying and was so worried about me. She did all she could to make me feel better–and I did feel better. I was reminded that I still have Boudica, and that, as much as losing Mary Jane hurts, it will pale in comparison to losing Boudica. So I had better treasure my time with that amazing girl.
I picked a feather from Mary Jane to save forever. Ron said he took her by the coop to say goodbye to the flocks, and Rooster was visibly upset. That old boy is also moving very, very slowly himself. Ron took her about a half mile into the woods to feed a hungry someone, maybe a fox, maybe a hawk. He lay her at the base of a big, beautiful Ash tree and told her how much he loved her and how thankful he was to know her. He told her the story of the day she was pardoned from processing and why she stood out from the others. That trauma was a part of her story, and she always carried herself with the wisdom of having seen some things.
There are so many lessons there that I don’t know if I will ever learn them all in this lifetime, but I will try.
I am going to miss her terribly. It feels like the end of an era.
She would have been 8 years old at the first of June. She was a Freedom Ranger meat chicken and one of the most intelligent creatures I have ever met. And one of my dear friends reminded me of this important lyric in Tom Petty’s song:
“She said, ‘I dig you, baby, but I got to keep movin’ on, keep movin’ on'”
