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The Rural Voice, 2005-02, Page 29more often putting all their eggs in one basket. In many farm families the wife fed the flock of chickens and gathered the eggs. The egg money was her "spending money". Once a week my mother cleaned the surplus eggs with a cloth dipped in vinegar and took them to the grocery store in the village which housed an egg grading station in the back. I think in Mom's case she spent this money on other groceries. There is a story in our family that our great grandmother, who came from County Deny at the time of the mid -nineteenth century potato famine in Ireland, saved the egg money for many years to send one of her sons to the seminary to be a priest. This apparently caused dissension in the family when it was discovered, because her husband, also Famine Irish, was not Catholic. My father looked at this as an underhanded deception on the part of his grandmother but I prefer to think that she was only taking a share of the farm produce to which she was entitled. I often accompanied Mom when she looked after the chickens. Our hen house had two sections, one where hens roosted and dined on grain and oyster shells, while the other housed the separate nests where they laid their eggs in soft straw. The nest area was dimly lit, and on one occasion when we were collecting eggs, mother put her hand under what she took to be one of our white Leghorn hens. She touched instead a furry black animal with a white stripe. Yes, of course it was a skunk, feasting on the eggs he had found, and none too happy to be disturbed. We left rather abruptly, Mom nearly tripping over me in her eagerness to retreat and breaking some of the eggs we had already gathered. Similar accidents must have resulted in the saying "Don't carry all your eggs in one basket." I was dispatched to summon my father to deal with the intruder. Another apt expression, "There's a skunk (or a fox) in the hen house" implies some sort of treachery and that was certainly my message to Dad on that occasion. My father bought a hundred chicks in spring and these were put in a brooder 'til they became old enough to survive without artificial warmth. The coop for the chickens was open to the outdoors. One year a thunder storm and torrential downpour flooded the area and cut off the hydro. We were away at the time and when we came home we discovered that the chicks had crowded together under the brooder for warmth. The result was that they either drowned or suffocated. I clearly remember my father shoveling up those chickens for burial. Most years, however, the chicks survived to become scrawny pullets and then good layers by late fall or the following spring Sometimes one of the hens would stubbornly set on her eggs and become aggressive when we tried to gather those eggs, clucking noisily and pecking at our fingers. A broody hen might hide her clutch of eggs away in a nest in the hay mow, guarding them jealously, hoping for them to hatch, though not all always did. From that failure comes the The sayings of barnyard hen -raising still persist in urban vocabularies adage "Don't count your chickens before they're hatched" The hen would eventually emerge, proudly strutting in the garden and orchard with her flock of fluffy yellow chicks scuttling along behind, a pretty sight and one that I have not seen in recent years. I was always nervous that I might inadvertently step on one of those balls of fluff, unseen in the long grass. One year the hay mower accidentally destroyed the nest of a pheasant in the hay field. Dad brought the unbroken orphan eggs to our latest setting hen and she willingly accepted them. I wonder what sort of complex that hen may have developed on contemplating her strange -looking offspring. The chicks did survive until the fall when they disappeared, hopefully to rejoin their own kind. Despite the current trend to specialization, the maxims relating to chickens live on. Even 21st century city dwellers use the old rural sayings. Don't be surprised to hear your stock broker warn you not to put all your eggs in one basket or an executive mention a skunk in the hen house. On our farm, mixed farming gave way to a herd of registered Holsteins about 1950. The pigs and the chickens disappeared and the hen house became a storage area. The team of work horses had gone earlier, so the only farm animals to be found were the dairy herd. As far as animal husbandry was concerned, all our eggs were in one basket.0 Tired of Paying High Heating Bills? Try alternative heat Burn wheat, rye, corn 1 bushel a day will heat your home. Also great for garages, shops, rec rooms, etc. Cozy Comfort rt Grain Comfort Maxi Comfort Call Grain Stoves Inc. RR #3 (39278 Westfield Rd.) Blyth website: www.grainstovesinc.com email: grainstovesinc@@sympatico.ca 519-523-9897 1-888-320-4042 FEBRUARY 2005 25