When Chickens Happen

When I first brought chickens to the farm, I had an idyllic vision. I imagined them gracefully scratching the barnyard, nibbling on the occasional bug, laying warm, perfect eggs in the straw, and generally just looking wholesome and picturesque. Like a pastoral painting.

The Pastoral Dream

Reality had other plans.

Let’s begin with the garden. Remember those sweet little zinnia seedlings I lovingly started? Chickens remember them too. As lunch. They uprooted the whole bed in one afternoon of gleeful chaos. Then came the tomatoes—delicately pecked full of holes, like a poultry version of Jackson Pollock.

The barnyard itself? Less like a peaceful farmyard, more like a chicken-engineered minefield. Dust bath craters everywhere. You haven’t lived until you’ve watched a goat nearly snap an ankle falling into a surprise poultry pit. (Goats, as you may know, are naturally talented at self-injury—but that’s a story for another post.)

They poop on everything. They roost where they shouldn’t. They bully the goats out of their feed with the kind of shameless bravado that makes you question the natural order of the universe.

So I declared: No more free-range mayhem! I built them their own yard—a dedicated space where they could live their best, destructive little lives in glorious containment.

Little Houdinis not in the chicken yard

I used cattle panel for strength (because if it holds a goat, it should hold anything short of a rhino), and I covered the large squares with chicken wire. I didn’t bother with the bottom row—the squares were tiny! Surely no chicken could fit through that.

Ah, my sweet clueless self.

Within a day, the chicken's yard was nearly empty and the barnyard & garden full of feathery chaos. So I re-did the fence with taller chicken wire, starting from the ground up. A solid four feet of poultry-proof optimism. That lasted two whole days.

Then the Great Chicken Escapades began again. I spent a week hunting down escape routes like a cartoon cop foiled by a flock of egg-laying criminal ninjas. Every morning, fewer chickens in the yard, more chicken craters in the barnyard. Mornings spent searching for eggs since these rebel hens are laying in every nook and cranny of the barn and barnyard.

Eggs in the Barnyard. Again.

Eventually we got it down to four or five renegades. I clipped wings. I watched one of the roosters fly over the fence after I clipped his wing, which frankly feels like cheating. But fine. The next day only two chickens were out—both with clipped wings. I stood there, baffled, until I watched a hen shimmy—like a feathery ferret—under the gate. Through a gap that couldn’t have been more than four inches tall. I swear she smirked at me while doing it.

So this morning’s task was burying a 2x4 under the gate to block their latest escape hatch. I’d like to think this will solve the problem, but deep in my soul, I know this ain't over. Chickens are determined. Chickens are crafty. Chickens… happen.

Pray for me.