I hate Chickens!

I don’t mean with Barbeque sauce, I mean pecking away in my backyard. It was a black day when my wife decided to become a chicken farmer.

One eventful day 4 years, 1 month, and 3 days ago I arrived home from work to find a plastic tub in the middle of the living room with 4 cheeping, beeping little chicks. We live just out of the city limits of Eugene Oregon; it’s only kind of rural with our neighbor having only a miniature horse in the backyard. If I didn’t outright veto the idea of chickens then my wife takes it as a green light. So I hadn’t really disapproved of the new arrivals but Little did I know what lied ahead, but I had a pretty good idea.

The first thing I was tasked with on the chicken honey do list was to build a coop; I spent a day sawing and pounding away using my meager carpentry skills to make a suitable chicken home. After that I pretty much put my foot down that I wasn’t going to participate in this semi urban chicken ranch other than to do the -your big and strong- grunt labor. I really didn’t want to be involved in the feeding, cleaning, and general caring for the birds. “I’m not a farmer!” I proclaimed…but I end up doing chicken chores anyway.

We put up chicken wire to keep the chicken in their pecking space but, they still get out, crawl under the fence, and start pecking around in the neighbor’s yard. Not the people who have the small horse but my other neighbor who got mad at me when I complained about the smoke coming from his boat engine, it was on a trailer and he was revving the engine. The smoke was entering my kitchen and stinking up the joint. He got back at me by throwing bait fish onto my roof. Luckily old smoky wasn’t home and with the help of the kids we did a commando mission to round them up and put them back in our yard.

I can see the chickens plotting their next move, they cluck to themselves things like “*cluck*, do we go over the fence, or *cluck* do we dig?” They enlisted the dog as an accomplice by luring him in with a half eaten grilled cheese sandwich that was thrown into their yard. The dog dug under the chicken wire to get his prize and in the process dug an escape tunnel for the chickens. The dog has a new harness now that attaches to a rope and stake in the middle of the yard.

Because of chickens I’ve become a mouse mass murderer. Storing big bags of chicken feed and corn in the garage attracts the little buggers like ants to an open jelly jar. If you see one you can bet its brother Squeaky, aunt Jumpy and all of its cousins are hiding in the insulation of your water heater. I hate mice.

My wife mentioned wanting to get a bee hive while driving down the road yesterday. I firmly said “No Bees! I want nothing to do with bees and their little stingers” Please god if you really exist don’t let her get bees!

I hate Bees.