Keep a confident posture, no matter what.

Learning from Chickens Series

It brings me joy to watch our happy chickens doing their chicken things on the farm. In the mornings, after I’ve completed all the chores and before I dive into a project, I like to just step back and watch them scratch, dust bath, dig for goodies, and play out their hierarchical roles. I’ve decided to share some of my observations from these meditations.

Deciding on this topic for today, I looked up from my pitchfork to see this molting Australorp. Less than 30 seconds later, I was able to capture a shot of her keeping her position despite not being in her best shape.

Yesterday as I was relaxing, enjoying a nice Autumn day with my buddies, a tiny, scraggly-looking Barred Plymouth Rock made me laugh out loud. Already on the smaller side, she’s included in the portion of our flock going through a molt right now. Molting means their bodies are working overtime to replace old feathers with new ones. They’re uncomfortable, missing protection from the current brisk breezes, and itchy. Using all available protein to grow brand new feathers in record time, they don’t even have resources left to create eggs (our production is currently significantly low).

What got me laughing yesterday was the little ratty Barred Rock pecking a much larger bird, and then standing tall to let them know who was boss. Such a helpful lesson — despite this being her lowest time of the year, she wasn’t going to let that pull her down the pecking order. The other hen didn’t say, “Hey! You look like shit, and can’t even lay eggs, take this!” Nope, the confidence exuded by the molting queen, even though she was on Level 1, commanded respect from the other, more physically vibrant chicken.

Don’t let a little seasonal downturn get you buried. You, and your feathers, will push through before too long.