Raising chickens

If you’ve grown up in a city, eating food from groceries and restaurants, the idea of raising your own chickens might seem mystical and romantic. “Ooohhh, think of all the FRESH EGGS we’ll have! And the CHICKEN MEAT!” You’ll hug your roommate, or your boyfriend, and your glasses will touch, and you’ll tumblr about all the chickens you’re going to make.

Then you get the cute little chicken coop, and the chickens, and you find out they’re loud, and shit constantly and everywhere. It’s not “Oops, Mr. Bock-bock made a widdle doodie!” Chicken shit looks like dogshit, but it’s coated in white urea, so it looks moldy, and it’s mixed and matted down with feathers. The birds stir the food and the shit up because they’re stupid fucking birds. And then they get bored.

The fact that chickens get bored of scratching around and laying eggs and being meat is another revelation you’ll have with your romantic backyard chicken farm. The chickens get bored, somehow, and they fight, and injure each other. You have to buy TOYS for the CHICKENS so they can PLAY WITH TOYS and not hurt each other.

Oh, and they don’t cockadoodledoo either. They scream constantly, from four or five in the morning, throughout the day, and sometimes night.

Chicken meat is a few bucks a pound and eggs are even cheaper. Don’t turn your life into a hell zoo.