While racking my brain for a story to tell in this space, I read a daily newspaper’s headline which said, “Egg prices are soaring; don’t expect that to change anytime soon.”
And that got me wishing I had a place for a small chicken coop and a few hens. I didn’t take my temperature but perhaps I should have for chickens were my least favorite animal while growing up in the country. Why would I ever long to have a small chicken coop?
Chickens habe never cooperated with me. When I was a youngster living on Blauvelt’s Hill, they didn’t like me when I entered their pen to gather eggs or refill their feeders and watering devices. And they never seemed pleased when night came and it was time to shut them in the hen house. But I couldn’t blame them. I never wanted to go to bed with the chickens because the best television programs aired after the chickens were put away.
Other animals were much more cooperative.
The hogs, ran to their trough whenever they saw me coming with their slop bucket.
The goats would jump up on their stand and nibble on the grain provided when it was time to do the milking. When called at feeding time, the horses ran in at full speed from the pasture.
The cow was always waiting at milking time and willing to stand wherever asked to have her udder drained. Most days she was milked in a little shed attached to one of the gasoline station’s outhouses. But if the person doing the milking was also watching the drive, the cow would stand under the cottonwood tree in front of the station with the cats gathered around hoping for the first squirts of milk.
Perhaps the problem with the chickens was that we never got baby chicks.
Our chickens were usually old hens a farm wife was taking to the market in Superior. Dad often traded gasoline or kerosene for a cage of old hens. He then tried to coax a few eggs from the hens before my mother stewed them.
Eighty years ago this week the McIllece Hardware Store at Lawrence was reported to have a few oil burning brooder houses in stock. I find that hard to believe.
I can’t envision an oil burning brooder house. While we sold kerosene at the filling station, many of our customers called it coal oil. In the spring they bought “coal oil” to fuel their brooder stoves. The stoves were often a blue or back enamel coated, circular shaped device used to keep baby chicks warm when housed in a small wooden shed called a brooder house. The brooder house was not to be confused with a hen house. The brooder house was the chick’s nursery. As they grew, they were moved to an apartment house known as the hen house. In the hen house each hen had her own nest.
My parents kept a mental note of how many eggs were gathered from each nest and if the hen wasn’t meeting her quota, she was the next to be dressed and stewed.
Stewed chicken was not my favorite meat. But homemade chicken and noodles was among my favorite meal features. Farm raised chicken and homemade noodles could be combined with mashed potatoes or made into soup. Either made for a delicious meal.
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