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Maybe's avatar

What a brilliant idea! And when our economy is destroyed, we will have chickens to barter.

Of course, this will be difficult for people who don't have yards. Or who have local or airborne varmints. Or who can't find chickens to buy 'cause they're all dead.

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Pilgrim's avatar

"I’m terrified of birds"

Well that explains this piece.

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Richard Von Busack's avatar

And of course, everyone in America has a huge backyard. I saw it in a movie.

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Rad's avatar

Voters to Trump - shove a chicken up your ass, you pathetic, lying piece of crap.

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Russell Meyer's avatar

And (drum roll) chickens don't lay eggs in the winter; only factory-bred chickens do. Factory-bred chickens lay eggs through the winter because they're exposed to light 24 hours a day. Year-long egg laying also shortens their lives to about two years. A chicken living its normal life — some would say, humanely cared for — live a natural life span of about five or six years.

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John Gillick's avatar

alternatively, we could all buy apples wholesale on credit to sell on street corners for five cents each!

These people are such clucking idiots

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Richard Von Busack's avatar

Would you mind moving down the street? This is MY corner. Apples, ladies and gentlemen, fine apples for quality gentry!

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Jeff Levine's avatar

I wouldn't know how your HOA or the other tenants in your building or your neighbors will feel about it, but if raising chickens is the only way you can afford eggs, eat something else.

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Zyxomma's avatar

Ta, Robyn. Oh, and where are urban apartment dwellers supposed to keep their backyard flocks? Apart from renters or owners of garden apartments, we have no backyards.

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jte's avatar

Did the Ag secretary just say that industrially produced eggs suck? Ooooooh, somebody's going to have to have a sitdown with some very powerful lobbyists tomorrow! Sounds like poultry DEI to me!

And somebody probably already pointed this out, but buying some chickens to lay a dozen or so eggs for you a week is WAY more expensive than buying them from the market. Add up what you spent on the coop, on the feed, and the time you spend feeding them, cleaning the coop, etc. and you're like actually sinking a $1 or more an egg into the whole thing. There's a reason they call it "economies of scale." Oh, and then they stop laying for a part of the year, esp. if you live in a northern climate. And then they stop laying altogether after a couple of years and then it's time to explain to the kids about Sunday's chicken soup and that's no fuckin' fun.

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Pixeloid's avatar

I hope it's still OK to feed my crows. Started feeding a pair a over a year ago, but they had babies last spring and now there are 5 coming around every day. Don't have close contact, but do periodically clean the bowl. They mostly poop near the street... mostly.

Something I didn't expect is that they keep all other crows away. They don't bother other birds or animals, but don't tolerate other crows.

Of course, I'm not getting any eggs out of this, but they eat some pests in the garden.

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Jennifer Murphy's avatar

What if you don't have a backyard? Or your town says you can't have chickens. Or you don't freakin' want to have a chicken coop?

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Mexfiles's avatar

MAGA! Make American Garden Again! How many people, though, even have back yards any more... or -- for those bougie enough to have a house and yard -- aren't in some HOA that might not be amenable to anything in their yards but perfectly mowed grass?

But, yeah... corporate ag sucks, though having depleted the ag indursty's work force thru deportations, and the inevitable rise in food prices, "thanks" to US sanctions on food exporters Mexico and Canada, you might need Victory Gardens.

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Dogfather's avatar

Young woman I work with went to Agway? with her father to buy some chicks. No go. all sold out.

They did have some turkey chicks.

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Jennifer Murphy's avatar

Turkeys are mean.

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Maybe's avatar

So are a lot of people, so it all works out. Of course, I imagine turkeys can also catch bird flu since they are birds.

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Mexfiles's avatar

I didn't know Agway was still around. My uncle was a lifer there, going back to running a general store for them, back when they were GLF.

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jte's avatar

Luuuv my local Agway. Need some screw or a lightbulb or other fixture? You're in and out in 3 minutes, as opposed to 20 minutes you spend wandering around Lowes or somewhere looking for a single goddamn employee to help you.

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Cakes We Like's avatar

Vaguely topic adjacent...

I bought Mr Cakes one of those Smart Garden things with the light to germinate seeds and grow plants year round. It must be 2 or 3 years since I bought it for him but we finally set it up a few days ago. We're trying our hands at growing some cascading mini tomatoes and a few varieties of loose leaf lettuce first, then I'm going to try to start some flowers off ready to transplant into the garden.

Smaug has already tried to destroy it all. I've had to sellotape the caps over the seed pods to stop him from knocking them off and eating them.

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Mommadillo's avatar

People hug chickens? Really? I love critters of all kinds - my mom used to pick up my jeans from the laundry room floor with a broomstick in case there was a snake in one of the pockets - but I can’t say I’ve ever hugged a chicken.

Do the chickens enjoy it?

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Zyxomma's avatar

My friend who lives in a holler (hollow) in Kentucky has beautiful pet chickens who love snuggling with her husbands, who also enjoys the experience.

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Cakes We Like's avatar

I had 3 hens, they cost me about £20 each, I bought them at "point of lay", so there was no wait for them to begin producing eggs. A big bag of layers pellets cost me about £20 and kept the girls fed for around 3 months. Between them, the girls laid 3-4 eggs almost every day.

The biggest expense was buying them a coop, I think I spent about £120 on ours, but they can be built, or bought second hand, for less.

Bird flu is a risk, the only real way to avoid it is to prevent your hens from having contact with wild birds or with food dropped by wild birds. If you have space for a covered run then it's do-able. We didn't have the space for a covered run, so the first bird flu outbreak saw us bring the girls inside and resort to a dog crate filled with straw for overnight, and chicken diapers for the day time.

Or there was the time we had them living in the bathroom we don't use much (we have 3). That was when the garden flooded).

Chicken keeping isn't for everyone, but it was good fun, and we hope to do it again some day.

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Dogfather's avatar

Chicken Diapers! Not a bad band name.

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Old Man Yells at Cloud's avatar

Or an alternative nickname for Orange Turd.

https://youtu.be/o7_OWYrLVOU?t=27

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Maybe's avatar

I believe trumpy wears Chicken Diapers.

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