A couple of days ago I posted about Sally Henny Penny's demise. While she was roosting in the barn a predator snuck in and killed her. Death on the farm is not uncommon. Our poultry are for meat and eggs and in that regard they feed our family and other families in the area. We give our animals a good life and treat them humanely and in death, a certain dignity. Not so with Sally Henny Penny. She was violently killed by a neighborhood dog and the meat wasted. She still had some good egg laying years left in her and all that was taken away in an instant.
For some strange reason, as I am apt to do sometimes, I began thinking about freedom and the analogy between life in the barnyard and life outside of Our Makers' Acres Family Farm. You see, Sally was raised from a baby chick and was nurtured and protected from predators in a chicken tractor. She had rice and oyster shells and water carried to her and she prospered and grew as she scratched around for insects and worms and grass seeds. She was happy.
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| Young pullets in a tractor safe from predators |
Oh, we could've left her in the chicken tractor and she would've been safe for a long time, I presume, as we pushed the tractor to fresh grass each day. But Sally Henny Penny longed for freedom. She wanted to stretch out her wings and... Okay, I'm getting carried away. Chickens can't really fly too well. They make awkward, unsuccessful attempts, but I wouldn't call it flying. Anyway, back to the story. One day when the birds were about 25 weeks old, we opened the door to the chicken tractor. At first the birds were tentative but then, you could almost see them smile as they skeedaddled out of the confinement and relished roaming around. Freedom! Freedom to eat, scratch, run, take dust baths, chase bugs, poop and generally engage in the reckless abandon of chickenhood.
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| Free to roam |
When they were in the chicken tractor, we made the decisions for them, we protected them, they didn't have free will. Once free from the confines of the tractor, they became masters of their destiny. They made their choices and lived (or died) with the consequences. The pasture is lush and contains a 'salad bar buffet' of delectable grass and clover, bugs and frogs and there is plenty room for the chicken to explore. But, it is a also a big, bad world out there on the pasture. There are hawks and owls and dogs. There are cows that will step on you if you get too close. There are neighbor's kids that come visit from the city and are so excited to see farm animals that they will chase you around the pasture until your chicken tongue is hanging outside of your beak from exhaustion.
Freedom definitely has its rewards. Old Red, the rooster, enjoys his life being a rooster, roaming around managing his flock, strutting with that rooster swagger.
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| The Cock of the Walk |
Freedom also has a high price from time to time. The freedom to roam and be the master of your own destiny exposes you to risks. Sometimes freedom exacts a hefty price as Sally Henny Penny learned.
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| Poor Sally Henny Penny |
In a nutshell, life contains a mixture of risks and rewards for both Sally Henny Penny and us. We can live in hermetically sealed, sterile, antiseptic, bubble-wrapped, bicycle helmeted, protective worlds supposedly safe from any germ, pain, sickness, evil or any harm or discomfort that might come our way. But is that living? Is that freedom? Life is for living! In my opinion, we should live life to the fullest. We should manage risk by doing our best in determining the dangers that are out there and taking precautions to minimize them, but we are fooling ourselves if we think that we can protect ourselves or our birds from all dangers our there that may exist.
The barnyard, which can be a microcosm of society sometimes, can teach us valuable insights - at least I think so. Here's one of my favorite quotes by Theodore Roosevelt that sums up Sally Henny Penny's eulogy nicely:
"It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat."
Theodore Roosevelt
"Citizenship in a Republic,"
Speech at the Sorbonne, Paris, April 23, 1910
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