With designer coops and doting owners, some pets scratch out a very comfortable living, as on Davis Islands.
By RON MATUS
Published April 30, 2004
[Times photos: Toni L. Sandys]
Lee Medart feeds Prudence, Plucky and Patience a morning snack of American cheese. Other times, they get brown rice, lettuce and tuna. “Don’t call my chickens wildlife. They’re pets,” she says.
Prudence is the eldest of three Davis Islands chickens. “They’re just delightful,” their owner says. “I love them.”
Lee Medart has fresh eggs whenever she wants them. She says, wrinkling her nose, that supermarket eggs are old.
DAVIS ISLANDS - Lee Medart's pets make fertilizer, keep roaches in check and squeeze out the building blocks for omelets. And if that wasn't enough to make dogs and cats seem like freeloaders, she insists her pets are "loving." To prove it, Medart scoops Prudence into her arms and advances on a stranger.
"Want to pet her?" she asks.
Prudence gently clucks.
Medart's pets are chickens.
The Davis Islands resident isn't the only person who thinks the chubby barnyard birds make cuddly backyard companions. Across the country, chickens are popping up in cities and suburbs, not to be fried or barbecued, but spoiled and pampered.
In Seattle, a community group holds how-to workshops and draws hundreds of people for an annual City Chickens Tour. In Iowa, a hatchery ships chicks to more than 1,000 hobbyists every week. The well-to-do among them pay $5,000 or more for ornate coops.
The common denominator: For those far removed from farm and wilderness, the presence of a live chicken offers an earthy reconnection.
Chickens "bring a bit of nature to you," says Medart, a retired computer systems analyst.
For proof, see Wheezy.
Supporters of Hyde Park's famous rooster told the St. Petersburg Times in March that Wheezy, his significant other and their 16 little ones would be moved to a farm far from cars, cats and code enforcement officials. A trapper corraled the hen and chicks, but second thoughts left Wheezy a free bird. Last week, supporters brought him a new hen.
"We're attached," said Louise Wallowitz, one of Wheezy's biggest fans.
No one knows how many pet chickens exist in the United States, but anecdotal evidence suggests numbers are growing. Near Danville, Va., Egganic Industries sells hundreds of elaborate coops each year. Iowa's McMurray Hatchery ships chicks around the country, including to boxer George Foreman and singer Loretta Lynn.
The company has filled hundreds of orders from the Tampa Bay area, said co-owner Murray McMurray. For the 33606 ZIP code, which includes Davis Islands and Hyde Park, company records show seven people requested a catalog and one ordered chicks.
Why the buzz?
To be sure, chickens are cheap (from 50 cents to $4 each); they don't cost much to feed (about $7 for a 50-pound bag of grain); and there are scores of varieties (from the humble gray Plymouth Rock to poodle-ish Silkies). Beyond that, the back-to-nature vibe dovetails with the trend-setting power of celebrity.
"Maybe we owe it to Martha Stewart," says Egganic's co-owner, Nancy Keel.
Before the domestic icon began pondering a pen of her own, Stewart touted pet chickens on her TV show and showcased her birds' home, the Palais de Poulet.
Egganic's standard "hen spa" costs $1,000, but it has sold $5,000 deluxe models with sun rooms and cedar shingles to a big-name architect in Boston and software executives in Washington. A 2002 Wall Street Journal story described a Manhattan decorator with a $2,500 coop shaped like a pagoda and a California lawyer whose chickens strut amid olive and fig trees in her courtyard.
On Davis Islands, Medart was inspired by Organic Gardening magazine.
For Prudence, Plucky and Patience, life is good. No hormones. No buggy barns. No gory demise in processing plants.
Instead, afternoons are spent scratching for worms in the back yard, beneath the shade of a half-dozen citrus trees. Every day, Medart feeds the trio a salad that includes romaine lettuce, brown rice, grated cheese and tuna fish.
For taste, Medart says, their eggs are galaxies ahead of the pale-yolked pretenders in supermarkets.
"Those are old eggs," she says, wrinkling her nose.
At least two of Medart's neighbors keep pet chickens, including one whose bird rides in the back seat on trips out of state.
Fears about Tampa's animal ordinances make many local owners reluctant to come out of the coop. Even Medart paused before agreeing to be interviewed.
Since May 2002, she has spent more than $1,700 on her chickens' vet bills. If her pets were snatched away, "I'd cry, like I'd cry over losing a dog," she says.
City rules prohibit farm animals but allow animals that are legitimate pets and not a public nuisance, said Bill Doherty, Tampa's code enforcement chief.
If chickens crow relentlessly, run amok or poop on neighbor's cars, the city won't hesitate to cite owners and, if nothing is done, hire trappers, he said.
Otherwise, the birds can strut in peace.
If there's a potential downside to chickens as pets, it's the same one that dogs every pet trend: abandonment.
But wayward chickens don't have to be wasted. In Seattle, a teacher who conducts chicken workshops takes back the unwanted and gives them to an appreciative new owner.
