Raising Chicks

By the time I got old enough to start helping, there were no more cows on the farm, so all we had left were the chickens. If anyone wanted eggs, they would come and buy them at the farmhouse from Gramma. Now I was collecting the eggs. Pop taught me which nesting areas not to take from, for those were nesting chickens. So every day I would go to Gramma, get the basket, and collect the eggs. Then I would bring them back to the farmhouse where Gramma cleaned them and put them in the cartons to be sold. By this time, my brother and sister hadn’t been coming up to the farm as much, for they were off with their friends. So Pop and I took on the workload together. I did not consider it work, for I enjoyed the time with Pop and the animals.

When the chickens were slowing down on their laying of eggs, Pop would start to kill a few to make room for new chickens. I never asked what happened to the chickens after he killed them; I just liked helping him with this chore. That might sound bad, but this was something that just happened on a farm. It had been something I had grown up with, so Pop would roll out the big log he had from a large tree that had fallen. He saved this log just for the chickens. I don’t know why, but I didn’t mind watching him chop off the head of the chicken. Then after the head was off, he would let go of the chicken, and the chicken would run around in circles until it dropped on the ground. My brother and sister were there for this most of the time. After the chicken dropped, my brother would run over, pick it up, and bring it back to the log for Pop. This is when he would chop off the legs, and my brother and sister would each take a leg, pull on the cord, and the claws would open and close. I really didn’t like this part because they would chase me all over the yard, pulling the claw open and closing. When Pop started to walk to the house, I would run over to the porch and go into the kitchen with him.

Grandma was in the kitchen, waiting to get the chicken to be cleaned up to be put in the refrigerator. As Grandma was getting things ready, Pop would start pulling off the feathers. Norman would also help pull them out. When they were done, it was time to cut it up into pieces. Pop would make the first cuts, and then we would take the pieces he cut up and pluck off the little feathers until the chicken was all clean. Then Grandma would take the pieces to the sink, wash them off, and then they got wrapped and put in the refrigerator. When we were doing this last step, Pop and my brother went outside to clean up the log to be put back in the barn for the next time they needed it.

I did ask Pop why he let the chicken run around after her head was off. He told me that it helped the process of having the chicken bleed out. That’s when I told him I didn’t know why, but it was fun watching it run around in circles. What can I say? This is what I grew up with, so it was normal to see things like this happen. This was the first of many to be killed, for we had to make room for the new chicks that were on their way. Pop had ordered 50 chicks, and they would be here in the next week or so. He needed the time to cut down on the chickens in the chicken coop.

Grandma had the kitchen ready for the chicks. She had a box that was put next to the stove. This way, they would be kept warm. Then I would put some hay in the box for the bedding, and then we were ready for them to arrive. Pop told us they should be here Monday or Tuesday at the latest. At the end of the day on Sunday, I would feed the cats last before going home for dinner. So before I would go, I said goodbye to Grandma and Pop and headed home. I wanted the day to end, so we might get a call from the post office that our chicks were in. We only got new chicks about every three to four years.

The next morning, I went to school, and when school was over, I would go directly up to the farmhouse to see if the chicks had come. Grandma said not yet, but it was early yet. They would call as soon as they came in, I’m sure. So I would go and see what Pop was doing, and I would help him out. We had to start getting the holding space ready for the chicks when they would be old enough to move from the farmhouse to an outside building. There wasn’t any heat in this building, but Pop had light bulbs that hung from the ceiling to give them a little heat. Then we would hear Grandma calling us, saying the chicks were in

The post office had just called and said, “Please come and get them.” I would call out to her, “Okay, we will go right up.” So we stopped what we were doing and got into the car.

We went right to the back of the post office and knocked on the door, letting them know we were there. The door would open, and they would say they were glad we came so fast. Being fifty or more chicks, they did make a lot of noise. There would be two boxes with twenty-eight or so in each box. They always put in a few extras just in case some don’t make the trip. Pop would open the trunk, and we would put them both into the car. We wouldn’t open the box at all until we got them home and in the kitchen. They were only two to three days old; they shipped them as soon as they hatched. When we got them into the house, we put one box into their new home and opened the box. It was my job to take them out of the box and count them. From when I started doing this, we never had one die in the shipping, so we had fifty-five or more chicks.

They were happy to get out of the box, so when both boxes were empty, we would put some feed in the trays for them and fill the water dishes. In the beginning, we would have a board in the box to keep them close together to help them stay warm. In a few days, we would remove the board, for they do grow fast. I would go up first thing before school and check them out and see if they needed more food or water. They would all clump over by the stove to keep warm the first few days. The stove was a working wood stove that they used to cook with, and it also heated the house. Most of the time they did have heat in the house, but that was only a backup for really cold days. There were two floor grates in the hall on the floor and one in the ceiling to heat the bedrooms upstairs. They always had the stove going, for you didn’t want it to go out; Grandma was always using the stove to cook something. By the fifth or sixth day, when the chicks would get out of the box and be running around the kitchen, she would tell us it was time for them to go outside in their new home. Not all of them got out, but a few of the stronger ones would get out when I would walk in to feed them. So after I would put in the food, I would have to run around the kitchen collecting the chicks. It’s as if they knew me; they never tried to get out when Grandma and Pop came into the kitchen in the morning. Well, I guess food will do it every time. The first day this happened, the chicks were moved the next day. But only the ones that were able to get out.

Their new home needed to warm up a little, having the light-bulbs on in the morning, and we would start moving them after lunch. Then we would put down some fresh hay for them. So after lunch, we would start the move. The first ones were the ones running around the kitchen. By the time we got them into their new home, Grandma would be calling us to come and get some more.

As the day progressed, Grandma called us more and more. She would come out on the porch and call out, “Debbie, I need you!” So whatever I was doing, I would stop and go back to the farmhouse and collect the loose chicks, for Pop felt they were ready if they could free themselves from the box. When Pop would order the chicks, he always wanted them to come on Thursday or Friday so that I would be able to see the chicks when they came in. Then, of course, over the weekend, I had a lot of time for them.

Almost all the chicks were moved, but a few hadn’t gotten out of the box yet. In just two days, we were almost done, and Pop told us that we could finish moving them. For they were ready to join the others, so out of the fifty-five chicks, around ten to fifteen were still in the house a bit longer than the rest. They would all gather under one of the lights to keep warm; there were four lightbulbs hanging from the ceiling just above the chicks. So the circle of chicks got larger and larger as we got them moved. When they were all moved, we would take apart the box that was in the kitchen. Grandma loved this part, for she got her kitchen back.

As they got older, we were able to turn off the lights. When they weren’t clustered under the lights, we knew it was time. So by turning one light off one day, in a few days, they were all off.

They would have to stay in the holding shed until they had their feathers. This didn’t take long at all, so when it was time, we just opened the door, and I would grab a cup of food, and they would start coming out. When they were all out, Pop would close the shed door and say, “You have them all.” The other chickens were already out of the chicken coop, so all I had to do was walk toward them, and they would all gather. When it came time for the chickens and the chicks to be put to bed, they knew it was time. There might be a few strays to gather, but not too often did this happen. When we got to the chicken coop, all we had to do was walk in, give them some food, and shut the door. There would already be some on the perches they sleep on. By the time I was ready to leave, all the chickens and the chicks were on the perches, ready for the night.

When we would move the chicks to the chicken coop, we would move them all; this was easier because they would follow us. My brother and Pop would start letting them out of the boxed-in area they were in. My sister and I would be outside, and we would take turns walking them over to where the other chickens were. During the day, the chickens would be outside in the farmyard, so when they saw the other chickens, they would join them. We did this until all the chickens were together. We still had all the roosters in the bunch, for they were young enough not to be a threat to the adult rooster.

On Sunday mornings, I would go right up to the farm because Grandma always cooked us breakfast, and we would have pancakes. We loved Grandma’s pancakes. Then we would go to the chicken coop and gather the eggs to bring to Grandma. She would clean them and put them into egg cartons. This happened every day. Then they were ready for Pop to deliver on Monday morning around the island. I remember seeing a logbook after Pop passed, and it said “One dozen eggs: twenty-five cents.” It had all the prices, but that’s the only one I can remember.

During this time, Pop would be taking some more of the older chickens out of the chicken coop to make room for the new ones. You couldn’t have more than one rooster. They would fight each other, and you could end up having both of them getting hurt. Usually, out of the fifty-five, there might be three, sometimes four. Pop would call people on the island who had chickens and ask them if they needed a new rooster. He would usually find homes for them, so they didn’t have to be killed so young. It is always good to replace the rooster with a younger one, so the people were happy to take them.

As soon as we would see some friction from all the roosters, we would pull the ones we were getting rid of. But one we would keep became the only rooster. This next step wasn’t easy; we needed to catch the older rooster and not get hurt. For the roosters aren’t as tame as the chickens. But it was time for him to retire. So my brother and Pop would put on gloves and coats to protect themselves. Pop had a net to put over him, and then my brother would pick him up. Then the rooster would be brought over to that special log—so you know what happened to him. I finally asked my Pop, “What will happen to him?”

He replied, “He will become Sunday night’s dinner.”

“No, we eat the roosters? The chickens, I sort of knew, but the rooster?”

That is when I figured out when the chicken was tougher than usual, it wasn’t really a chicken. It was a rooster.

Pop told me, “There is no waste on a farm. You use all that you can.” I told him that I wasn’t going to eat him. Pop laughed and said, “You have eaten roosters. Your mom has cooked rooster many times at your house.” I wasn’t ready for that. I told him we had had chickens that were chewy, and I didn’t know why, but now it made sense. Mom would tell me that it must have been an older chicken, and I believed her.

Later that day, when I got home, I told my mom that I knew about eating the roosters and that Pop had told me when he was killing the rooster today. She said, “I knew you would find out one day, but I wasn’t going to be the one to tell you.”

Then I said, “We’re not having chicken tonight, are we?”

“No, we have a few chickens in the freezer, so Pop will be keeping him,” she told me.

I was glad to hear that. I really didn’t want to eat him. It really did bother me after I knew we were eating Pop’s chickens; I thought she was getting them from the store. Even though they are really the same, they were raised better than the chicken farm. So this is how I came to accept the fact I was eating our chickens, not from the store.

It was bad enough eating the eggs that had become fertilized and had the little blood spot on the yolk. It is all the same, but knowing that could have been a chick didn’t sit well with me. But the fresh eggs did taste a lot better than the eggs you get in the stores. It is worth the extra money people charge for the fresh eggs in a cooler on the side of the road. They have a totally different texture and a much better taste.