Circle M Farm

We lost the little white chick. Literally, for a day, we couldn’t find the tiny straggler anywhere. And then we did, dead, just in front of the chicken house.

The spot of dry, packed earth in front of the chicken house is our farm’s version of a congested inner city. At this time of year, the sheep, cows and goats haven’t yet started rotating through our circle of pastures, so all live together in the front paddock with easy access to the calving barn. They like to congregate in front of the chicken house during feeding time in the morning and during the hottest sunny parts of the day. The situation is dangerous there for a chick, or even a little lamb or goat kid, but part of learning to adapt to life on our homestead is learning to live with other species, some of which may be a lot bigger. The lambs and goats quickly learn to hang around the outside of the feeding melee. In fact, they are like a gang of teenagers butting heads on the fringe of their society. But this little chick wasn’t ready for that yet.

Shannon has gathered up the rest of the chicks, and the very fiesty little mom, and put them in a smallish brooder cage just outside of the henhouse. They have their own water and food, and they can socialize with the rest of the flock through wire fencing. They’ll stay bonded to their hen, and she can show them the ropes on the farm later, but for now they’ll be safely contained out of harm’s way. I usually gather up chicks the moment I find them and put them in the brooder, but this hen was doing such a great job of keeping track of everyone, I thought they’d make it outside with her. The white chick, though, was always toddling along behind the others and likely got misplaced through it’s own weakness. Survival of the fittest, my boys would say. I always want everything to survive! Coddling a weak animal can create lots of work in protection and nursing down the road, and rarely makes sense on a homestead. That doesn’t mean we don’t do it – it just means that when a weak or slow animals dies, we experience a feeling of appropriateness and balance along with the grief of a life having been extinguished. Sounds odd, but it somehow all fits together.