I was talking to a friend the other day. She’s a gentle soul, a kind-hearted person who says, “I could never kill an animal” with wide, pained eyes that let you know she’s not talking in hyperbole.
She wants chickens. She wants them bad. She wants the experience of fluffy little chicks and she wants hens to weed for her and she wants her daughter to have that mini-backyard-petting-zoo experience.
She has, up until now, not given into her chicken-keeping desires. For this I am so proud of her.
You see, there’s a reality to chicken keeping that doesn’t show up when you are scanning Pinterest for gorgeous coops. (I maintain a Pinterest board of chicken keeping and coop inspiration, by the way, if you are into that kind of thing.)
A continuous supply of plentiful eggs requires a continuous supply of hens at laying age. For us non-commercial chicken-keepers, a good rule of thumb is that hens will lay pretty consistently (with periods off for molting, reduced day length and broodiness) from about 6 months old until about 3 years old. Although you will hear a lot of anecdotes about individual hens that keep pumping out eggs until they are 5 or 6 years old, the general consensus is that three years old is usually the beginning of the end for consistent egg laying.
Call it Henopause.
“Woh. Was That A Hot Flash?!”
A well-kept backyard hen, protected from hawks, raccoons and Fido, can easily live to be 8 or 10 years old, and ages of twice that are not unheard of.
Bear with me here as I do some Urban Homesteader math. One layer hen eats about 1.5 pounds of layer feed per week. (Pastured birds will eat less purchased feed – yet another good reason to buy this book and study it before you design your coop and run.)
If a chicken starts laying at 6 months old (this is a bit later than average but it makes my numbers easy) and has essentially stopped laying by 4 years old, and lives naturally to be 8, a backyard chicken keeper is looking at 3.5 years of egg production time, and 4.5 years of Pets Without Benefits time. That’d be 351 pounds of feed going to a hen that isn’t making eggs!
Current, local prices for the layer rations I feed my hens is $28 per 40 pound bag, or $.70 a pound. Admittedly, this is a bit spendy, but I get the locally produced, happy-hippie, GMO-free feed from the lovely folks at Scratch & Peck. At those prices, it costs $245.70 to maintain a hen into theoretical old age and natural demise while you aren’t getting any eggs.
Which means those half-dozen cute peeping balls of fluff you take home from the feed store in spring could cost you $1474 during the time when they are not giving you eggs. And of course I’m not including the cost of bedding, a fractional share of the coop, potential vet bills, etc.
Meanwhile, if you live in a city or suburb, you have an even bigger problem: your now non-laying hens are taking up your legal urban chicken quota which could be filled with younger, laying hens, and you are stuck. You can’t just keep adding to your flock indefinitely when you live on 1/12th of an acre in Seattle. So now you are a Backyard Chicken Keeper without any Backyard Eggs.
If your hens are pure pets, this is all totally fine. These are very reasonable amounts of money to spend on a pet, and if you are not resentful in the least at having to buy both chicken feed and grocery store or farmer’s market eggs, then Chickens As Pets is a wonderful path to take.
There is another option, of course. This is the option you won’t tend to run into on Pinterest. It’s not the solution of a soft heart so much as a calculating head.
You can make the decision to cull your birds when they are past prime lay. This is what all commercial egg operations do, and what “real” (as opposed to “urban”) farmers do, and what everyone who makes a living and not just a hobby from animal husbandry does.
Culled laying hens aren’t good for roasting or frying but they make unbeatable stock and stewing birds.
So basically those are your two choices: you continue to pay and care for chickens that barely give you eggs or you cowboy up and you deal with the slaughter of no longer profitable hens.
Back to my friend who really, really wants chickens.
Could she kill her chickens?
Oh no. Absolutely not.
We both agree, she doesn’t have that in her. Fine, I’ve no problem with that, and I’m glad she knows herself.
Does she want to pay for chickens even if she gets no eggs?
Well, not really.
Fine, I wouldn’t either – I totally understand.
I told her quite bluntly (as is my way) that she should not get chickens.
Can I give them to a chicken sanctuary when they get too old to lay? Some place that has a no kill policy?
No. No. You cannot do that.
She can’t, and no one reading this can. You know why? Personal responsibility. Your chickens, your adoption, your decision, your responsibility to see it through to the end. You do not get to embrace the idea of a more intimate relationship with your food chain and then make that food chain – the food chain you specifically set up – someone else’s problem when shit gets real.
There is a local urban farming message board that is filled – filled – with people trying to give away their three year old chicken to a “good home.” Are you kidding me? You own the chicken. Your home is a good home. And once it’s not, your soup pot is a good soup pot. I once joked to a good friend that I could stock my freezer for the entire year off no-longer-laying hens being given away free “to a good home.”
This pisses me off, as you can probably tell. There is absolutely nothing ethically superior – and quite a bit that is ethically dubious, if you ask me – about enjoying the benefits of a young laying hen and then turning over the care or slaughter of that hen to someone else once it stops laying.
That is not how animal husbandry works and it’s not how pet ownership works, and those are your two choices. I don’t care which path you take with your chickens, but pick one. Playing Little Suzy Farm Girl until it’s time to get the axe and then deciding you aren’t up for chicken ownership just doesn’t fly with me.
Normally I am a Rah-Rah Cheerleader for this quirky way of life, and I think any fair assessment would deem me particularly encouraging to beginners. But a chicken is not a seed packet, it’s an animal and a responsibility. If you can’t cull your own birds or can’t provide for them all the way into their Chicken Social Security, then please, do not get chickens.
252
Meh. I have chickens, I cull, but I don’t slaughter. Why? Cuz it’s a messy pain in the butt. I don’t agree with the basic premise of this article, which seems to be if you can’t kill it, don’t raise it. My chickens are all too happy to go another family that eats them. They come with a box, they leave happy, I’m happy. The chickens aren’t going to care who is eating them.
best comment here yet… I totally agree. I am fascinated by this thread as everyone seems to have some strong opinion but it all really boils down to what you wrote… were talking “eithics” here so…
“The chickens aren’t going to care who is eating them.”
yep.
In fact I think this article is silly because what better way to learn about the cycle of life and animal husbandry then to actually partake in the process… who cares if people end up with an old chicken they don’t want… having moral problems to solve is part of the human experience. I think based on what everyone has said here, if people are ignorant of “reality/nature/whatever” what better way to become acquainted? a petting zoo?
i don’t think so. and there are always people willing to eat your animal if you don’t want to. so don’t worry about it… raise your chicken and love it… if your done with it someone will eat it for you. no sweat. chill out ppl. even if you put in the earth for a proper burial, then mother natures creatures will eat it for you 🙂
My brother always told me…”Don’t own an animal unless you are prepared to take it’s life.” As in put it down. Everything has to die sometime…people, animals. Death is always a hard subject for most people, however being blunt and honest about no one or thing lives forever. Now put on your big girl panties and get it done.
I wish the comments had a “like” button so I could like this.
i would like to like it… like a 100 times. “big girl panties” hehehehehehe
disagree. I have cats and dogs, I would take them to a vet to be euthanized.
ok, I get not wanting to kill an animal yourself which you raised and seeing it as a pet, but if you eat meat, then what’s the difference between your chicken and any other chicken? Why not just let someone else do the butchering?
Past their use-by date chickens are extremely effective in the permaculture way of life where your chickens do all the work for you in the garden. Their scratching around in the soil saves me many hours of weeding. Eggs of any quantity are a bonus. It’s a bonus also for them that we are vegetarian. So until their scrawny little feet turn upwards to the sky there will always be a place in our home for Fang and Mrs Kefoops.
Interesting topic and definitely one that has been on my mind lately as my chickens are 6 years old. I have 4 chickens, have never put a light in their coop in the winter (so they get a break) and I still get about 3 eggs a day. I understood when I got them that their egg production would start to taper off at around 5 years old and it seemed like it was last year, but this year so far they are going strong. I have known for awhile that I will soon be forced to make a decision about whether or not I want to have pets that don’t make food or cull them. I do not plan on culling my own chickens if that is the route I decide to go. There are people that will do that for you here in Seattle. There is also an “old chicken haven” that I am considering that as well. I think these are valid options and find your stance on culling your own chickens and keeping them until the bitter end a bit closed minded and hard core. All of these are valid options and personal choices. I think people should know what they are getting into when getting chickens, but I don’t believe that they should have to be willing to cull their own chickens to do so. There are other options.
I grew up on the farm and the chickens were my job & my allowance machine (from selling the eggs). I will tell you (and anyone that will listen) Chickens are the dirtiest, grossest creatures ever ~ but there eggs are wonderful! Cleaning the coop is disgusting!
I would also tell anyone who is interested in raising a few pullets – or butchering some of their layers – get someone else to chop ’em, pluck ’em and dress ’em. It would be so worth it to me to get someone else to take care of all that. Mom & Dad chose 1 year to raise pullets and my aunt/uncle went in with them on the expense. They chose a Saturday and everyone came over – I think they chopped about 10 of the birds, plucked maybe 4 or 5 and then called the local “whoever chops, plucks & dresses” tons of chickens in the Lincoln, Nebraska area. (There are companies that do this – farmers just deliver the chickens and pick ’em up afterwards.)
Pay someone else to deal with it!
I will say though that chickens provide a TON of laughs. There was the time the big golden rooster we had chased my 3 year old cousin away from the coop where he liked to go to chase the chickens. There was the Saturday morning I went out to do chores and found them all lying on their back ugly feet pointing at the sky and turned around and told dad to clean up the DEAD things….
I have kept pet chickens for years. Originally, I got them to create my own chicken poo compost. But I never got really organized with it. However, my back garden doesn’t grow weeds much anymore. They cleaned the dirt out for me. I’ve never been that interested in the eggs. I’m down to three hens, and when they finish living out their lives, I’ll be done with chickens for a while. I want to add pretty groundcovers to my back garden, which isn’t going to happen with the birds running free and consuming. They roost in my weeping mulberry tree at night.
I don’t butcher my stew hens. The reason why is it is too expensive. I can sell them for $15 each and asians who prefer their chicken fresh not fermenting in a grocery cooler will line up to pay $15 for an old but large hen fresh and flapping right before they eat it. Now if I butcher that hen for stew I don’t get the $15 and so I basically paid $15 for every old hen I decide to put in the freezer. For that kind of money I am better of raising actual meat chicks and putting them in the freezer. So every fall I put an ad in craigslist and sell the hens I don’t want to winter over. Buyers are happy, I have some money to help offset the feed bill and the new batch of birds that hatched over the summer have more elbow room!
Actually, as long as the person giving away the hens knows up front that I’m not going to be petting them, I think it’s ethically fine to choose to outsource disposal of non-laying hens.
I get free meat, you got the eggs you wanted, your kids don’t have to eat Miss Clucky and my kids get dinner.
I’d much rather spend an afternoon butchering chickens once in a while than care for laying hens every day.
We got our first chickens about 6 months ago with the understanding that we would butcher them when they quit laying. We only have 6 in our backyard and get 4-5 eggs a day. Pretty sure one pullet is not laying yet and one we knew was older when we bought her. I had no idea you could get attached to chickens!! They all have names now and no way I could butcher them now. They will just have to be with me until the end. So much for egg production!!!
For those that have asked about locating a slaughter/processing facility where they can take their older hens or roosters for processing – Do a search for a “Custom Exempt” processing facility in your area. There may be one located in a rural area nearby.
Here is the link to an excellent breakdown of Livestock Slaughter and Meat Processing Requirements in California” from the University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources website:
http://ucanr.org/sites/Grown_in_Marin/files/83682.pdf
The meat processed in a Custom Exempt facility “is intended for consumption in the owner’s (the person who purchased the animal) household and must be consumed by the owner or members of the owner’s household, which can include the owner’s non-paying guests and employees.” Federal law prohibits the resell of any meats processed at a Custom Exempt facility.
Here in the San Francisco Bay Area, there are a number of facilities available for small quantity processing. Personally I have used Riella Farms in Manteca for processing poultry, and Ibleto Meats in Cotati for processing a goat. I have found the pricing to be quite reasonable.
I had to laugh at Erica’s comment “I once joked to a good friend that I could stock my freezer for the entire year off no-longer-laying hens being given away free “to a good home.” Somehow last year I ended up with 8 or 9 older hens from friends who didn’t mind if I put them in my freezer. Although I normally process my own poultry and rabbits, there are times when packing everyone into the livestock trailer and taking a drive is the way to go. Between my own meat birds (chickens and ducks) and those extra hens, I put 60 lbs of poultry into my freezer that day. I also had them process my friends turkey while I was at it. Rather than spending the entire weekend processing (and probably not finishing), I was back home by noon with a full freezer. I’ve had some excellent meals since then.
I absolutely do NOT have time to read blogs. I archive them for that magical day…..but I read yours. It was worth every minute. Well written, and needed, too. Great article!! My grandpa struggled all his life with this aspect of farming. He learned at a VERY early age from a Jewish butcher, and hated butchering his hogs, chickens, rabbits, and cattle. He hunted, too. Grandma could put 60 chickens in the freezer in one day, with plenty of help, and it was hard on her, too. But his little Banties followed him all over the farm. He wore his heart on his sleeve but I would not have changed a single thing about him, and neither would anyone else. Thank you for explaining everything so well. Blessings!
I’ve slaughtered chickens with a friend of mine. He raised them for meat. I wanted to know how it’s done and he taught me. I love animals and I love chicken. I went into it looking at it not as killing an animal, but learning how to feed myself. If there ever comes a time I need to know this, i’ll be ready. Don’t look at it as a pet, look at it as if you don’t do this, your family will starve.
Great article and comments, and while it feels generally supportable to ask that meat eaters and keepers of animals participate in the entire life cycle, I have to remind myself that I occasionally drive a car across the Golden Gate bridge and I don’t require myself to build the car or the bridge. In the same way I won’t require myself to kill my chickens personally when they pass their viable egg-laying period.
Thanks for this post. It’s not romantic after layers go through henopause, I live rurally so can afford the months when moulting and heat affect the laying…never mind the ordeal of buying healthy chicks to find out the 6 that you purchased from a reputable sale, are roosters ….
Can’t imagine having hens in an urban setting so thank you for this post and urbanites can support rurals by buying eggs off of their rural neighbours! I only charge enough for the hens to earn their keep which for us is a mere 2.50 a dozen….feed in my area is plentiful and inexpensive luckily….thanks again for this post…..
Excellent article! I have dogs and so when my chickens get old they are slaughtered and fed raw to my dogs. They are good for them as they are good raw bones with little fat. I also have a fair number of English Game Bantams not for eggs but for keeping the bugs especially the ticks down around my dogs as well. They can serve other purposes besides eggs and I love the eggs don’t get me wrong. But we get grasshoppers every year and I never have any in my yards and they eat loads of bugs without any toxins in me and my animals environment and I love that as well. The egg laying girls though- they do get eaten eventually. I do go in knowing that.
man that’s some good advice.
Great article! It does not put me off at all from the idea of getting chickens for eggs, and then using them later for soup. Are there processing places that would do the dirty work for me, like with cattle? I don’t know the first thing about how to correctly put down a chicken. Thanks!
There’s a third option that’s probably been mentioned by now: Give the chickens away to someone who doesn’t mind doing the butchering. Around here there is no problem finding someone to take stewing chickens off your hands. any area where there are first generation immigrants will have a ready supply of people who are willing and able to make use of old hens and excess roosters.
When we get chickens, we only want about 5 for egg laying and when they no longer produce, we’ll let them retire to old age, use their poop for fertilizer and let them eat the bugs. When we get goats, we only want about 2, when they no longer produce milk, they’ll retire to old age and use their poop for fertilizer and let them graze. I see them as useful while in their prime and even afterwards, without culling, also I have nothing against culling, but I’m not going to buy goats and hens for making money but for personal use.
I don’t have a problem with people donating their birds to the zoo, or giving them away on Craigslist, or offering their chickens free “to a good home.” I’ve butchered one chicken, and I was committed to doing it, but it wasn’t easy and not something I look forward to doing again (though I will, when the time comes). But, I do think it’s important to at least have a PLAN for the inevitable. And to anyone who thinks their “free to good home” rooster is going to retire on a nice farm in the country… If that’s your plan, have at it, there are plenty of dishonest people who will be happy to support your delusion in exchange for a week of free dinners. But seriously, if you think about it for a minute, and do the math, you can probably figure out you’re only fooling yourself.
SO… you bring up something I’ve been mulling over for a few weeks now. Can I ask you a few questions? I’m sitting on the fence for the obvious reason of: Can I really eat a chicken that has been kind-of like a pet? I’m sure my husband can. You mentioned they make good stock broths, (I’ve made these with the deer bones my husband brings home from hunting trips). Stock broths are incredibly healthy & as appealing to me as the eggs -so it leaves the plucking & cleaning part that is my main concern… What’s that process like? You’re an excellent writer. Can you make it real for me?
Nice and well put!
Yes! My fiancee, who grew up on a farm, frequently teases me that I’m not a “real” farmer, because I do have a difficult time culling my old non-producing, time-consuming, hay-eating dairy goat does, as well as my “pet” wether and another non-producing hermaphrodite doe. And I cried when a former partner with whom I had chickens, and guineas, began the butchering process (guineas are FAST and had to be shot, but make excellent soup!!). Having said that, however, in times past I have eaten wethers that I’ve raised and 5 of my best-bred 8-month old doelings, who were killed and then left by a cougar. It was the best way to honor those doelings’ lives, and, I must say, some of the most tender and tastiest goat meat I’ve eaten.
From my experience, there is something beautiful about having raised an animal, taken its life in a good way, or honoring the natural cycle of another creature’s taking, knowing it intimately, and yes naming it, and then at the dinner table when saying “thanks” for my food, I can consciously thank that specific animal. There is something nurturing to my soul and nourishing to my body to have the honor of having had a personal relationship with my food so that to say “thank you” is not just something I do, but a heartfelt experience and expression of true gratitude for the sometimes harsh and emotionally painful reality of the circle of life, including the consumption of fruits and veggies. (that goes for trees and lumber, too, as I’m in the middle of a heart-wrenching “thinning project,” but that is a whole other, albeit similar, thread … :-D).
WOW, you mean your not gonna tell everybody how wonderful and money saving chickens are? COOL. I see the same Irresponsibilty taken with all animals. it all starts when folks buy these animals dont take responsibilty for spayneuter, or immunizations, then tie them to a tree or stuff them in an undersized pen, and ignore them until the stench causes them to abandon said animal, or the animal becomes a vicious threat or a disease carrier. makes you wonder if they have the same Non-compassion for humans in their keep.
Amen! I couldn’t agree more! People who would normally be appalled by people getting rid of dogs and cats when they become inconvenient seem perfectly fine with doing it with chickens. I just don’t get it.
I think some of the problems in the article are a little exaggerated. The cost of food can be greatly reduced by feeding kitchen scraps. Chickens will eat anything and it’s a great way to get rid of scraps and leftovers that no one ate. Also, if you let them out once or twice a week they eat bugs, grass, etc. I also just give them the cheap chicken food. So food cost doesn’t have to be so great. Also, if you garden, the droppings are great for composting, if you have the time and the space, so there’s that benefit. The cost of the coop needn’t be too extreme either. You can make a perfectly suitable coop using almost entirely free materials if you are savvy. And as for culling, I don’t. I think of the birds as pets and appreciate their service and they get to retire and hang out after they get henopausal. Just build a coop that holds 12 birds and buy two or three new ones every every two or three years. The woman mentioned at the beginning of the article hardly sounds like she wants to get a commercial egg farm running. How many eggs can she eat?It is possible to get sick of eggs too. I have used them for every type of egg recipe and still have some to give or sell with a family of four. (I have 5 hens just over 3 years old so I got another 4 new birds to pick up the torch.) So, I think the woman should get absolutely get backyard chickens, unless she lives on a microhectare, doesn’t generate food scraps or garden, and is extremely concerned with her chicken food to egg ratio. They are also entertaining to watch and I like the buk-buk-buh-gawks.
Jeff, This is why her friend should absolutely NOT get chickens:
Back to my friend who really, really wants chickens.
Could she kill her chickens?
Oh no. Absolutely not.
We both agree, she doesn’t have that in her. Fine, I’ve no problem with that, and I’m glad she knows herself.
Does she want to pay for chickens even if she gets no eggs?
Well, not really.
Fine, I wouldn’t either – I totally understand.
I told her quite bluntly (as is my way) that she should not get chickens.
Can I give them to a chicken sanctuary when they get too old to lay? Some place that has a no kill policy?
No. No. You cannot do that.
She can’t, and no one reading this can. You know why? Personal responsibility. Your chickens, your adoption, your decision, your responsibility to see it through to the end. You do not get to embrace the idea of a more intimate relationship with your food chain and then make that food chain – the food chain you specifically set up – someone else’s problem when shit gets real.
Ha! I keep backyard chickens. 4 hens. I am quite attached to them. but I did threaten them this spring, “It’s the soup pot if you don’t start laying, ladies.” They started laying that week.
When they get old and unproductive I will probably donate them to someone who will slaughter them and make a stew. If I feel up to it, I will watch and learn how to do it myself.
I garden and give them scraps, made a chicken tractor to let them clean up the yard.
They cost maybe $10 a month to maintain with feed.
Let me make this short and sweet. I could NOT agree with you more. Death is a part of life. The best we can do is to ensure it’s as humane a death as possible. After that, it’s into the stew pot. Thank you so much for this thoughtful post.
How do I convince my city council that responsible urban farming is a good idea?
I fight it at every chance I get. It is not a good idea.
I too have backyard chickens who give me eggs and a lot of pleasure. We only have 4 hens (1 just recently got a tumor and we had her euthanized by the vet). I have 1 who will need to be culled most likely this winter as she hasn’t laid in about a year.
I’ve been involved in butchering our own animals before, and it’s stuck with me most of my adult life. The look in the cow’s eyes still haunts me occasionally 🙂 So, I found a humane solution for my “Little Beasties” that follows in the “death being part of the cycle of life”. We have an wildlife refuge/rehab near our home. They are happy to have the birds to feed the large animals like the cougar. They euthanize them first, then feed them whole to the animals. Although I will be sad to see Henrietta leave our flock, I made an agreement with my husband that I wouldn’t build a flock (we’d already had this discussion of what to do with our henapausal ladies.) Now, I know that she will be serving a greater purpose and will be treated humanely. If you have a zoo or refuge nearby, that may be the solution for us “softies” with limited space.
To go a step further, if you cannot bear to slaughter chickens, you probably ought not eat commercial eggs either. Having someone else slaughter their nonproductive own chickens out of your sight so you can afford to have eggs without killing nonproductive chickens is not morally superior to killing them yourself. Frankly, the inherent dishonesty of convincing yourself that any life form can live without expense to other lifeforms is not a particularly tenable moral stance.
I agree with you. I dont want to be a hypocrite about eating food.
I eat meat and I want to be familiar with all aspects of that process. As well as veggies. They too come with a price tag beyond what you pay for them.
I do not want to “eat without thinking” as our society does now. If you raise an animal to eat it, you will not waste any part of it. And you will be grateful for it in ways that are hard to explain.
Joseph Campbell made a lot out o this aspect of our evolution.
Eating other animals isnt SUPPOSED to be easy. We have lost the “sacredness” of food and are too disconnected from the reality of it all.
I love that you hit on the personal responsibility of adopting a living creature. I rescue and foster dogs and am always appalled by people who don’t think things through and then want someone else to take care of a living creature that they haphazardly decided to take “responsibility” for.
That being said, we have backyard hens and, indeed, the money going out is more than the egg benefit coming in…especially since we give about three quarters of the eggs away and the “mowing” benefit of eight hens on two acres of land is not even noticeable.
One of our chickens is eight years old, has long since stopped laying and we love her. When she was attacked by an escaped dog a few months ago, we moved her into the house, gave her the guest room and a crate, and nursed her back to health.
I name all my girls (Penguin, Lucy, Ida May, Frannie May, Jemima, Lulu, Maribel and Goldie Hawn). And we have accepted that we will be throwing money away in feed for them long after they have stopped laying.
If you love your chickens, you are not throwing your money away! You are just being a good responsible pet owner. Perfectly valid option. 🙂
We never mind keeping our older hens. I add daily vegetable/fruit peelings to their diet, plus buckets of pulled weeds from the garden & let them loose in the back yard late afternoons except during planting & growing season. They keep my garden pretty bug free and the abundance of free fertilizer is a bonus.
We have found that all outcome choices work for us. For example, if a hen is ailing and I can’t help it , my husband will quickly dispatch her for me. When our incubation and /or natural hatch yields too many roosters, we raise them to maturity and carefully transport them to a Raptor Refuge close by. The avian and wildlife specialists who volunteer there, need to feed the injured and often lifetime inhabitants, so our healthy but not needed birds are yes, killed, de-feathered, frozen and fed back into the wildlife rescue food chain. Recycling of another nature. Also, since I do care deeply about the treatment of ‘anything’ in my care, we have a number of old hens, still eating the most expensive organic laymash on the market, but, free ranging helps with costs and our own farm dogs somehow learned to patrol the skies with their eyes and fences with the noses, so old age is a graceful and protected state, notwithstanding chicken related pests ie. parasites, mink, seasonal ailments. The upshot is, we really don’t have too many ‘retired’ birds , 2Dot and Twin Pretty, yet we have 50+ layers, hens. Oh, the 2 year old’s aren’t laying well and we don’t sell their eggs anyway. We eat them. We’ll be making a yearly trip to the Avian Rescue Society soon.
So many comments, didn’t have time to read them all, but I grew up on a poultry farm in the 50’s and 60’s, and I saw plenty of chickens butchered for our dinners. Some had their necks wrung, some had their heads chopped off – was wondering if there were any more advanced ways of doing the job, but didn’t see any in the comments I read. Also didn’t see any mention of the butchering part – a little more complicated than “cut off its head, pull off the feathers, and stick it into the pot.” As I remember, you dunk the decapitated chicken into a large pot of boiling water for a little while to make the feathers easier to pull off. Then you have to singe off all the pin feathers that stick out. Then you slit open the butt of the carcass and stick your hand up inside to pull out all the guts. Then you wash it all out. THEN you can stick it into the pot. Somehow, it doesn’t sound like a job all the back-yard farmers are going to be able to accomplish. If I were going to keep a few hens for eggs, which I have contemplated doing, before I started I would locate a source for slaughtering and butchering.
I can slaughter, pluck, eviscerate and clean a chicken in less than 15 minutes. Doesn’t really take that long at all and definitely someone who wants to know how to do it can. Of course teaching people how to do it can take a lot longer, but on my own…no time at all.
Old laying hens that are going to be stewed don’t really need to be plucked. You can just “peel” them in the same way rabbits are dressed. Saves quite a bit of time.
I have four girls who are pets. Conveniently, they also happen to produce eggs. When they are too old to produce, they will live as pets until their natural deaths. And no, feeding them doesn’t cost nearly as much as you stated in the article. Our girls get everything compostable (vegetable matter, no coffee or tea remnants, etc.). A couple of times a year we buy a bale of straw and a bale of hay, and they’re in heaven for a few weeks, decimating both (plus it makes their yard smell very sweet!). They eat worms, bugs and slugs (I live on the west coast, and do we have SLUGS!). When we cut the neighbour’s lawn, they DIVE into his lawn clippings with glee (we don’t have lawn; have replaced it with moss and clover), and no, he uses nothing on his lawn that would harm the girls.
Most of our neighbours eat organic foods, and they bring their compost buckets over once in a while, too, as they don’t have gardens, but they know a bucket of compost will give them a dozen free eggs! 🙂
My 78 year old mother saves her food scraps for her “grandhens”. Truly, it’s a win/win for everyone!
Thank you so much for eloquently describing this harsh reality. My daughter wants backyard chickens for eggs, but neither she nor I have researched the prospect sufficiently to have realized this. We can’t afford pet chickens, and there’s no way she or I could slaughter our own, so clearly, chickens are not a good choice for us.
If you can’t kill them yourselves, find a local chicken farm and see if they can do custom processing for you at their farm. We raise chickens and process them all ourselves, and since we have the gear, we process for others, too, for a fee. Some folks come out to help – and learn how to do it on their own, some folks drop them off because they can’t handle being there when their animal dies, but they still want it in their stew pot. SO there is an alternative, you don’t have to kill it yourself, you might be able to find someone who can humanely do that for you. And if you are in Front Range Colorado, come find me, I’ll help ya!
You are just the kind of person I would like to find in my area!
Every living thing passes it’s prime at some time.
Thanks so much for posting this! Very useful and it makes me really think about whether or not I should make the choice to care for chickens.
I don’t think you should never get chickens. I think you just need to be cognizant of what you’re getting into. If you don’t feel like butchering them once they finish laying, there are options available to you, but most of them involve a chicken being butchered. If you absolutely don’t want a chicken pet to be killed but don’t want to live with it after it stops laying eggs, then maybe you should look at other pet options. To just blanket the decision with “you absolutely should not get backyard chickens” is not a very good way to look at the bigger issues involved in having food animals.
Exactly this: “If you absolutely don’t want a chicken pet to be killed but don’t want to live with it after it stops laying eggs, then maybe you should look at other pet options.”
Fantastic post. I just found your blog and I can already tell that it will be a regular read for me. I am NOT an urban farmer, but a super busy artist with aspirations of doing good things in small chunks of time….Inspiration keeps me going and I’m glad to find some with a voice that cracks me up.
Something important to me is the generation of organic fertilizer and the immediate recycling of waste from the kitchen. That may be more important than eggs in the sense that a person is seeing the bigger picture of sustainability and fertilizing the land. Also it is super concentrated fertilizer from food. This is a lot easier than waiting for a whole compost pile to breakdown and the pile can get sour which can be a huge problem if you have neighbors and really smelly to fix. It’s relatively easy to clean the coop to me. Also you can sell the chicken manure for money to people who want to know where their fertilizer is coming from and they can in effect help fund your project and feel they are helping too. The hens can also help hatch future eggs and help protect and defend the new baby chicks. I agree people should be responsible but also there are many ways to find the hens useful even after they have stopped laying.
Well said! Might I add that if you’re going to keep a pet (horse, duck, goat, dog, cat, etc.) have the nerve and sense of responsibility to put it down when its time has come and not list it as “free to good home”. We are providing a home for a number of unwanted “pets” because they have gotten to old for their original owners to have fun with. Be assured that when their quality of life is no longer enjoyable to them they will be humanely euthanized.
You should absolutely do whatever you want as long as you do it responsibly and with compassion. You should absolutely not let bloggers and people who think they know everything rule your decision making.
If you are willing to swipe and dine on the unborn of another species, you should be willing to slaughter the non-productive mother.
A child should understand where the chicken on their plate comes from. It’s not only perfectly acceptable, but commendable to show your child the entire process of killing animals properly and preparing them.
What’s shameful is the huge disconnect so many urbanites have from the process – earth to kitchen – that puts their food on their plates.
Oh, and if you asked the little tyke whether they want the chicken around for four years, or whether they want – and make a long list of specific toys – the other stuff they could get for $1400, I’m pretty sure that whole queasy-about-death thing will go away fast.
Thank you from a goose/duck and chicken farmer who hurts every time I have to kill my birds due to just normal things like spraddle leg or injuries. As they look up at me, peeping and bibbling contentedly I cut their heads off. You really think you can do this?
They are mine. And it is up to me to give them lives worth living. And when that part is done, to allow them as painless a death as is possible.
The part Id really like you to address is that people do not know ANYTHING about the many transmittable (bird to human) diseases and parasites there are. In cities you have “vectors” in the forms of pigeons, sparrows and starlings and rats. I NEVER want to see hens being kept in congested urban areas. Dont argue with me, go look them up at your extension site.
And that cages still need cleaning when it is 10 below and the birds need clean water and feed at all times. Even if you think you know this, until you are cleaning out chicken poop in winter you have no idea what it means.
People do not even understand the need for grit! Please stop fantasizing about keeping hens. Let the people who are outside the city limits and DO know about bird’s needs raise them for you with loving, educated and careful management of them.
Thanks for this article!
Connie
Don’t let anyone dash your hopes. Find your OWN way to make it work.
No offense, but did you read her whole post? She’s all for eating them. She’s all for keeping them as family pets. Either one of these is ‘making it work’. The only thing she’s opposed to is shunting the responsibility off on someone else.
100% agree. As long as you have the time it takes to give them the attention they deserve, to feed and keep their pen clean and free of pests. Also to muck out the coop which is not a fun job. I cant do it because of lung issue.
I would never tell someone too not get chickens because they couldnt kill them. It is not a dyed in wool rule that they have to be culled. Many are considered part of peoples family.
Another good, ethical alternative though is to make other chicken-raising friends in the area who slaughter their own chickens. Selling to them, or trading with them when your egg layers are too old for eggs could work out very well for all involved. There’s no illusion that your chicks aren’t going to become stock, you’re helping someone who is in need of them, and may barter some good supplies to continue your egg-laying aspirations.
I sure did. I agree with her and why I agree. My girls will have a happy life a swift end and not be wasted. I make soup out of bones head and feet. When all goodness is consumed they go in for compost to feed my plants.
I buy only Jemmy Den Sausage. I know someone that has been to the farm that supply’s thier pork. They are happy pigs that come running when they see people, get sunshine and a happy life.
I agree on the et thing, I have 1 pet chicken. If I thought she would like to be inside I would get her dipers. If I can no longer care for my chickens, they will go to my chicken keeping friends, and if I can, Clair is still alive, it will be diepers.
Bonnie