As featured March 4, 2011 on cnjonline.com
Why didn’t the rooster cross the road?
I don’t know the answer, but when the call went out over the police scanner this week, you can bet your bottom dollar I grabbed a camera and hurried for the scene.
The call that went out came from a sheriff’s deputy who asked dispatch to summon animal control.
Apparently a rooster was standing firm in the middle of the road at Fifth and Main streets and was disrupting traffic.
I can’t tell you how much I was hoping to get a photo for the paper of the chicken that wouldn’t cross the road, stopping traffic and attracting law enforcement.
But alas, by the time I arrived on scene animal control was leaving, I can only assume with an angry rooster in the back of the truck.
And absent a photo, all we ended up with in the office was a couple hours of chicken jokes.
But that wasn’t the only chicken I crossed paths with this week.
During small talk at the beginning to a scheduled interview for an unrelated story, an official, (who I won’t expressly identify) told me he enjoys my pet column and he confessed that he relates in part, because he has an unusual hobby.
He keeps pet chickens in his back yard — 10 hens to be exact.
And every day they produce about 8 eggs.
While he loves the fresh eggs and said they are much healthier than store bought, he admitted that 8 eggs a day is more than his family can use so they give eggs away, “like zucchini.”
I have to admit I found this to be a novel idea and have even considered looking into it myself, thinking with the amount of eggs consumed at my house, it might be a healthy and economical idea to just have chickens.
“Is it worth it?” I asked.
I think he said “not really,” but to be honest I can’t remember because of what he told me next.
Turns out he keeps them in a “rolling coop.”
I accept I may be the only person who didn’t know what this is but on the off chance there’s someone else out there who shares my ignorance, I’ll explain as he did...
A rolling chicken coop is literally a chicken coop on wheels that you fill with chickens then push around in your yard.
I guess by rolling it around it helps keep down the damage to your yard.
But he said the biggest benefit is that the chickens fertilize your grass and keep the insect population down at the same time.
He was very enthusiastic about the concept and even told me about a local source for the rolling coop.
Now I have to admit, I am still pondering this and am enamored by the idea.
Some of you may recall my complaints of a huge toad population last summer, which obviously means there were enough bugs in my yard to feed them — so a little insect control that doesn’t need electricity or result in nasty smelling vapors is a novel idea.
But a big part of me wonders if it wouldn’t be like the time I decided to make my own bread to save money and be more health conscious.
About seven hours later as I watched my family slather butter and honey on and then devour the two measly loaves I spent all day making, I concluded there was no way the supply could meet the demand unless all I did was make bread all day and it was worth two bucks to just bring home an evenly sliced loaf.
So maybe I’ll do a little more research...
Regardless of what I decide, I have to say the concept of a rolling, egg-laying, bug eating machine is pretty amazing ingenuity, perhaps even besting the all in one printer-fax-scanner.
My hats off to the fella that thought of that one and happy rolling to the lucky chicks that get to cruise in that ride.
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