Operation Chicken Run

"Nick: Here's a thought. Why don't we get an egg and start our own chicken farm? That way we'd have all the eggs we could eat.

Fetcher: Right. We'll need a chicken, then.
Nick: No... no, we'll need an egg. You have the egg first, that's where you get the chicken from.
Fetcher: No, that's cobblers. If you don't have a chicken, where are you going to get the egg?
Nick: From the chicken that comes from the egg.
Fetcher: Yeah, but you have to have an egg to have a chicken.
Nick: Yeah, but you've got to get the chicken first to get the egg, and then you get the egg... to get the chicken out of...
Fetcher: Hang on. Let's go over this again?"

Chicken Run (2000)

This morning my spouse and I headed over to Les Fermes de Gally near St. Cyr L'Ecole. We'd been meaning to visit for a long time but had no real excuse until today. For those of you from Seattle, Les Fermes de Gally are Swansons on Steroids. It's an old farm that's been turned into a combination nursery, garden store, and petting zoo complete with a corn field labyrinth and a U-Pick (fruits and vegetables).  Like Swanson's however, it is a bit pricey and we usually shop for basic gardening items at Truffaut's instead.

But this morning we had a mission that, alas, Truffaut could not help us with:

Operation Flophouse Chicken Run 

You see, we have this friend who lives in an area much like ours and a few months ago he bought chickens and has been raving ever since about fresh eggs and stewed chicken and, my oh my, did that sound appealing. (Isn't it sad how easily we are influenced? Such is the insanity of a new homeowner.)

So we started looking into it. Yes, apparently you can have chickens in the city here as long as you don't have too many of them - 3 or 4 chickens are considered to be "animaux domestiques" like cats or dogs).

Sweet serendipity was with us because, par hasard, today Les Ferme de Gally had a very large section of their store devoted to just that. They had everything we were looking for and some things we had never ever imagined.

Chickens in every shape, color and size

They had a huge selection of chickens in every shape, color and size.  There was a helpful guide with ratings that gave us an idea of how well each race performed in three categories:  as layers, as stew and as breeders.  (Though it did make me feel a bit as through I was buying a vacuum cleaner).

Chicken run - not the Hilton but not too bad.

It was when we got to the chicken runs that our mouths dropped open.  Every conceivable shape, size, color and, configuration.  Some of them very very simple.  Others were so classy I'd almost feel bad about using them for something so mundane as chickens.  The latter were pretty expensive too - around 800 Euros.  Too much.

The prices were enough to bring us to our senses and we escaped the store with nothing more than a couple of jars of jelly and some bags for the Clean Green (made in the PRC by the way - go figure).

On the way home the conversation vacillated between two extremes:  

"Chickens are stupid, filthy animals and this business will cost us money and add greatly to our household chores.  This is a bad idea."   

"Fresh eggs.  Chicken stew.  Baked chicken with thyme.  Fertilizer for the garden. This is a great idea."

When we finally got home I made a pot of coffee and we took our cups outside to walk the garden together.  

And right before our eyes was the perfect place for a chicken run:  a long shady area (the very place, in fact, where mom took out the juniper) in the back of the garden right next to the compost pile.

Not only would a small chicken run fit there, it would look just right.  Almost as if the space was made for just that very thing.

We have other projects we want to get done so we reluctantly left the garden to take up today's other tasks.  "We'll sleep on it and think about it again in the morning," we said.

Who in the heck are we kidding?   Reason has fled.  Sanity?  Well we lost that when we bought the house.  It's all about how the idea makes us feel (good).  We've simply fallen in love with the notion of raising chickens of our very own.  An activity which we are told is:  "écolo et de plus en plus cool."

We are fools.