Tag: meat chickens

Last Dance with Mary Jane

~ Crystal Sands ~ 6 Comments

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'”

But I’ll see her again. I know I will.

Food System

~ Crystal Sands ~ 2 Comments

Warning: This post includes a brief discussion of processing chickens for food.

This morning, we began processing our last batch of meat chickens for the year. We normally do one batch for our family and one batch for our dogs, but we did three batches this year because our Pyrenees, Bairre, has decided he really only likes to eat chicken for dinner. We can either buy meat from the food system where we know the animals are abused or humanely raise and process the chickens ourselves for our dogs to eat. We choose the latter.

And, when I say “we” process these chickens, I mean mostly Ron. I am just the assistant. Ron humanely culls, cleans most of the feathers, and then cleans the insides. It is my job to then get the chicken looking like one from the grocery store, so, when cooked with vegetables from our garden, our family just sees a beautiful chicken dinner as the end result.

I get the final feathers and hairs, clean the chicken super thoroughly, and process the internal organs for the dogs. We try to avoid waste. After all, a life was given for that food. Waste seems sacrilegious.

Even with my assistant job, I get so worn. I am up and down our stairs a lot, as we keep the chickens in the basement, and I spent a lot of hours leaned over our deep sink. It feels worth it though when I think about the alternative. The “humanely raised” is really important to me, but food safety is becoming more and more an issue.

Recently, it feels more and more important that we choose to live this way.. I have known for a long time that our American food system is in some trouble, but the recent listeria and E. coli outbreaks remind me of how important it is to build our own food system–at least as much as we can. The FDA and the USDA both regulate our food systems here in the United States, but they apparently do not communicate well and are also quite backed up and overworked. On top of these issues, apparently, some states, specifically I read about Texas, have simply quit complying with some required testing from the USDA. This was related to the bird flu, but who knows what else states or companies will decide to not comply with. It’s already quit a bit. Self regulation is not a great plan, at least if experience has taught us anything.

We also have a lot of inexperience and arrogance heading into our government, and in my other life working as an academic administrator who worked with federal agencies to secure grants, inexperience and arrogance are not a great combination when it comes to dealing with the giant bureaucracy that is government.

Yeah, I have some worries. I think we had better start working hard to get our food from a more local system.

I know it’s not possible for everyone who reads this to start raising meat chickens, but it seems important to start trying to remove ourselves from a broken food system in whatever ways we can. Maybe we get chickens for eggs and compost their poop to fertilize our organic vegetable garden. Maybe we connect with local farmers and join a CSA. Maybe we support any local markets that keep their supply chains local. I don’t know how common those are in other states, but we have a lot of them here in Maine. Maybe we work harder to create low-ingredient homes, cutting down on or eliminating processed foods (more on that later).

Pay attention. Wash your food well. Organic carrots were a recent culprit for E. coli. Cook your meats thoroughly. Make sure they reach the proper temps.

I wish I had more answers, but I do think we are on our own more than I feel comfortable with. I’ll always share what I learn to help us get through it all, and I hope you will as well.

photo credit: Anna Jakutajc-Wojtalik, Unsplash

We made it through processing day.

~ Crystal Sands ~ Leave a comment

*This post discusses processing chickens for food.

I was too full of anxiety to write yesterday. We processed our meat chickens today, and the night before is the worst. The worst.

Ron has to sharpen his tools. The grinding causes me more anxiety than I can express. These are long, emotionally-tough days. Thankfully, the day is over. Interestingly, for the first time, our teenage son helped us. He was shockingly competent and did way more work than I would have thought. He’s becoming a young man and is starting to really chip on the farm work, and he makes a big difference for us. Today, he made all the difference.

Because Ron also feels anxiety about the day, he decided he wanted to get it all done in one day. We usually take two days. Ron thought we could do it one day with our son’s help, but we thought it would be the longest day. We were up at dark, and I thought we might still be going at dark. Not the case. It was a 12 hour day. I was expecting maybe 15 hours. I can’t believe our kiddo was so helpful.

Ron, of course, always culled the chickens because his skill is good, and he has a lot of experience. We want no suffering. We researched for years trying to find the most human way to cull a chicken. I even talked to a neuroscientist. Only Ron can cull, but there is so much work to it all. Our son did some really, really hard work today, some that takes a bit of skill. I have no words for how thankful I am for our kiddo–and that today is over. I am also thankful to have all of this food for our family.

Interestingly, Ron agreed to let me keep one of the last hens. She was quick and smart, and I told Ron she looked fairly healthy. You can tell which ones have better genetics and might have a chance. Most of them can’t live very long. I should write about my experiences with that sometimes, as I have about 10 years of experience with it now.

She might have a Mary Jane-like chance. Even Vanilla is doing well. She is also a pardoned meat chicken who was small. She’s still just about regular sized as a chicken. Mary Jane is a big girl though. If those two can make it, it’s hopeful for her, though most of our pardoned meat chickens have only lived about three years. Of course, as Ron and I discussed, two to three years in our flock is way better her scheduled fate.

I have to think of a good name for her.

Lucy Lives and Other Stuff

~ Crystal Sands ~ 2 Comments

Lucy is still alive–and maybe in that last rally before death. I am not sure. The night before last, I was pretty sure she was within a day or two. But since she was still alive the next morning, I decided to give her one last spa day to freshen her up and pamper her a little bit. I only give spa days when a chicken needs a good scrub, which is rarely, but since Lucy has had health problems, she has a poopy behind. It was good to get her cleaned up.

Anyway, she came in, had a warm bath, ate treats, was still mostly indifferent to me–as this is Lucy’s way–and her energies have been lifted ever since. I mean, I know she’s going to die in a few days, but I am so happy she’s having a little rally. My gosh, she’s a trooper with a strong will to live. Tonight, when I was collecting greens from the garden, she was right there as I fed spinach to the flock.

We have been very busy this week. We also moved the meat chickens out of the garage and into their big house and yard last night. They are pretty little, but we decided to go ahead and let them make the big move since the weather is mild, and they are mostly feathered out. As we moved them from one side of our property to another, Ron and I got many steps in. One at a time, we carried 25 birds from the garage to the back side of our property where there is a coop and lots of trees and logs for the chickens to play in.

It’s a hard thing keeping meat chickens, but I won’t think about the end right now. As I carried each little chicken, I just focused on making them feel loved and telling them how wonderful it was going to be to get to play in the trees, grass, and sunshine. They took full advantage of their first day in their new space and played all day and found so many worms and bugs. It was cool to watch their instincts kick in. Without any mama to teach them, they just knew what to do. As we engaged in acrobatics and caught each of the 25 birds for bedtime tonight (in a couple of days, they’ll do it on their own), I saw some really full crops. Yeah, those little chickens had a great day in the sun.

And speaking of sunshine, we got a second day of sun today. I am so hopeful the strawberries are going to ripen. I think a couple will be ripe in the morning. They were close this afternoon when I last checked. Sadly, more rain and gray skies are coming, but maybe it won’t be as much as it had been. Last year, we baked in the sun. This year, we rarely see it. It’s a challenge for sure, but farmers and homesteaders always learning and adapting. The good is coming. It’s just a little different and a lot slower.

I’m really worried about my carrots though. Three plantings and still only partial sprouting. I still have much to learn, obviously.