Village chickens: trials, tribulations and three-egg omelets

Dawnelle Ki and Nick Ormes of Stutzman’s animal refuge rescued a Leghorn rooster and a Rhode Island Red hen at Ellis Park. They are among many villagers who have discovered the charms of chickens.

By Virgil Hervey

Sometimes they are secreted away in a garage or tool shed; sometimes their coops are right out where everyone can see them; and in some cases they run loose, but never ranging far from home. As with all things Yellow Springs, there is little agreement between the dozen-or-so keepers of backyard flocks in town as to how to raise their birds. But one thing they do agree on is that they love their chickens.

Village ordinances allow homeowners to keep chickens as long as they do not weigh over 200 pounds and do not constitute a nuisance or a danger to health. Rumor has it that the chickens have to have names, but nothing has been found to substantiate that.

Amanda Banaszak and Bobby Moore have been raising chickens in the backyard of their Dayton Street home for about a year-and-a-half. As is the case with most Yellow Springers who keep chickens, they think of them as pets.

“We have more than we need,” Banaszak said of her 18 hens. “We have chickens because my husband wanted them.”

According to Banaszak, Moore purchased feather-footed silky bantams from a local breeder after he heard about silkies that snuggled.

“They have turned out to be very sweet and docile, which is great for a pet, but not so great for self preservation,” Banaszak said.

If you have driven down Talus Drive recently, you have probably noticed a coop in the front yard of the Viemeister house, where Nick and Kathleen Boutis now reside. According to Kathleen Boutis, they fantasized about having chickens ever since they lived next door to someone who had a rooster in suburban Washington, D.C. Shortly after moving to Yellow Springs, they split an order of day-old chicks with Collette Palamar. They have 11 hens and are able to consume the 6–9 eggs they get every day.

Palamar lives on South High Street. She got the idea to keep chickens, she said, after her sister, who lives in Las Vegas, got some. She has nine, down from 11. One of her chicks turned out to be a rooster.

“The second time he crowed, one of my neighbors was knocking at my door,” she said. “Without the rooster, my neighbors are okay with my keeping chickens.”

According to Palamar, she gave the rooster to Mary Kay Smith who has a backyard flock of her own. However, Smith’s neighbors had a problem with the rooster, too, so she brought it up to Stutzman’s and asked them to take him.

Faith Morgan, who had raised chickens as a child growing up in the Vale, has been raising chickens on East Whiteman Street adjacent to the Antioch campus, since she moved back to town after a long hiatus. She converted a lean-to that is attached to the barn behind her house into a coop and has a secure chicken run, but she likes to let her nine hens run loose on the campus.

“I won’t keep a rooster out of respect for my neighbors,” she said. “They have been great about the chickens.”

Morgan has had as many as 16 chickens, but as with most of the people interviewed for this article, she has lost some to predators, in her case raccoons, opossums, and hawks. One night she came out to lock up the chickens and found two skunks fighting over an egg.

Susan Bradford and Brian Brogan live on the corner of South Center College Street and Xenia Avenue. Their 12-year-old daughter Ursula, who is a member of a 4-H club and volunteers to care for one of the llamas at Stutzman’s, has four chickens. She originally had eight that she got from her friend Rosa Dixon two years ago, but has lost some to raccoons.

According to the Bradford-Brogans, when Rosa got tired of getting up early to let the chickens out, her family, who lives on Wright Street, turned over the entire operation, coop, chicken run and the flock, to the Brogans. It’s been a learning experience, according to Bradford.

“My silkies go crazy over raisins,” she said.

Caring for chickens may be fun, but it’s not always easy. And sometimes it’s downright sad. Backyard flock owners get up shortly after sunrise to feed and water their chickens and, weather permitting, let them out of the coop. If they don’t lock them up securely shortly after sunset, they are risking a raccoon, opossum or skunk attack.

Most people who keep small backyard flocks think of their chickens as pets. They give them names and lots of affection, which in most cases is returned by the chickens, who like to be close to humans. They also reward their caregivers with eggs so fresh no market can compete. So it is especially heartbreaking to lose one to a predator. In some cases, whole flocks have been killed by weasels or minks. After a hawk attack, all that is left is a pile of feathers.

Maintaining a backyard flock is a struggle, but they all agree that it is worth it.

“I’m really glad Yellow Springs allows us to have chickens,” Palamar said. “They have brought me nothing but pleasure.”

*The writer, who has been raising chickens as pets for three years, has a backyard flock of eight hens.

Contact: vhervey@ysnews.com