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Community Corner

Backyard Feather Revolution

Backyard chicken farmers hope to revive longtime Petaluma industry, sustainably

On Saturday morning I stood in a chicken run with sixteen people and as many feathered friends clucking around our feet.

It was a , part of a series of Sustainability Tours offered annually by the local nonprofit . The Sonoma County tours cover topics ranging from food preservation to greywater systems.

But we were there to learn about one thing: raising chickens.

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“The ramifications of this simple act rippling out are profound,” said Rachel Kaplan, 47, a Daily Acts volunteer and backyard chicken farmer who recently authored the book Urban Homesteading: Heirloom Skills for Sustainable Living.

Benefits include connecting with your local food source and limiting the distance from farm to table. Roaming chickens also eat bugs and slugs, and turn kitchen scraps into great fertilizer for the garden.

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“Chickens are compost makers,” said Kaplan, who described the ecological process as a closed loop. In addition, chickens that forage for insects and worms are healthier and produce better eggs. She selects her chickens for their laying capacity, non-aggressive tendencies and physical beauty.

Sharon Bice, 54, grew up raising chickens and wants to add them to her small plot in Forestville. Though her family shares a nearby farm with several families, the eggs are eaten too quickly.

“I like the self-sufficiency, having animals and fresh eggs for baking,” she said.

Tina Wilder, 40 and Troy Silveira, 42, have been sharing their skills with Daily Acts for eight years. Raising two boys and fifteen chickens in Penngrove, the family often has a surplus of eggs to give away. The couple shared tricks of the trade such as what plants to grow and feed to chickens for optimal egg growth. (Hint: collards and comfrey, high in protein.)

“Get to know the weeds in your garden,” said Wilder, who feeds the chickens Bermuda grass from a garden she admitted is not manicured.

With their increasing popularity, the price of chickens—and their coops—has risen. Silveira recommends building your own—no matter your level of expertise. Theirs is made from repurposed materials such as discarded cedar siding rescued from a dumpster. Each emphasized the most essential part of a chicken house: protection from predators, including foxes, raccoons, and feral cats.

“It won’t be perfect right away, but experimentation is the fun part,” he said.

These self-taught suburban homesteaders weren’t always so knowledgeable. Silveira, who initially knew nothing about building, learned by working with stone in his own backyard, which led to a decade-long career as a stonemason. Having watched his sons play with Legos, he realized “it was the same thing.”

Kaplan built their coop four years ago with her friend, Stacey Evans, 48, who lives on the ¾ acre property in west Petaluma. The coop includes storage space, a pulley-drawn door and several nesting boxes. They spent $400 on materials, appreciating the look of the weathered redwood scavenged from an old fence.

The workshop also focused on topics such as the cost of chicken feed and whether to butcher the birds for meat, a notion Kaplan doesn’t take lightly.

“Killing anything is a big deal,” she said when describing what it was like to slaughter her own animals for food.

“(If we didn't), we’d end up with a lot of pets,” said Wilder, who culls her oldest chickens for stew, with the exception of two little Bantams who have lived to six years old.

But raising chickens is not without its controversies. When they decided to “force” eggs from their seasonal breeders by increasing daylight hours with artificial light in winter, Wilder worried that she was doing something unnatural. Then she thought, “We’ll just convince them they’re in Ecuador.”

“Chickens have very small brains,” agreed Dennis Bills, a participant from Healdsburg. He insisted that introducing the light was not “taxing” for the bird. Growing up with ten siblings, his family didn’t raise chickens as a hobby. They needed them for food."

Raising chickens was once central to the local economy. During the Great Depression, nine out of ten families in southern Sonoma County were chicken ranchers, according to the book Empty Shells.

Petaluma’s farms first began flourishing in the late 1800s, when flat-bottomed scows and steamers carried eggs along fourteen miles of the Petaluma Creek (as the river was then called), from the downtown docks to San Pablo Bay.

But it wasn’t until 1918, that a $50,000 campaign was launched to promote Petaluma’s prosperous poultry business. Near the railroad depot, a 15 foot tall basket proclaimed “Petaluma: The World’s Egg Basket." The industry declined following World War II.

Now, with the renewed interest in raising chickens and through groups such as Daily Acts, many hope to revive the practice that once put Petaluma on the map.

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