A Flat-Bladed Shovel, a Five-Gallon Bucket, and a Three-Inch Layer of Manure
(A boring English assignment [process analysis] made interesting)
I pull on my rubber boots. Muck is caked on them; I have seen no need to wash them, as their home is outside. I make sure that my sweatpants are tucked into the boots, and that my rubber gloves go over the ends of my sweatshirt. I look like I have no sense of fashion, but I don’t care. Today I must clean the chicken coop. My brother and my dad wave at me from across the lawn, beckoning me to hurry up. I sigh and put a hair tie around my hair.
The boots are heavy as I trudge out to the chicken coop. My brother points towards the inside of the coop, and I take a gulp of fresh air before I enter. There is no need to argue with him – I will only lose. I will be stuck in this place for about half an hour, fighting nausea and using the flat-bladed shovel to scrape up the muck.
Knowing how to clean a chicken coop is an essential skill in life if you are to own chickens. (My dad would add that it is also important if you are interested in marrying his daughter.) Chickens produce a large amount of waste, especially inside the coop. Because my family has about forty chickens, and all of us have been involved in this process of keeping chickens, I am qualified to tell you about this important job – cleaning the chicken coop.
In order to clean the chicken coop, you must first obtain one. My family did this by building one, which is the best way to go, as your local Costco, Walmart, and Home Depot do not carry chicken coops.
After you have obtained a chicken coop, you must buy some chickens and some food. Your local Walmart should carry chicken food – if not, complain to the manager and in about three weeks the chicken food will be in stock. (The food comes in fifty-pound bags; don’t send your petite mother out to buy it.)
The chickens can be bought as either mature hens or chicks. My family goes the inexpensive route and mail-orders newly-hatched chicks from a livestock store. The post office calls at five thirty on the morning they arrive; then we bring them home and feed them for four or five months until they are ready to lay eggs.
So far, you have a chicken coop, chickens, and food. Be sure not to forget about water – you can get dispenser for this at your local outdoors store. And you will want to buy a pair of boots while you’re there. Do not buy fancy boots – normal ones will do. (Remember, all of this is in preparation for the big day of chicken coop cleaning.)
Now you have had your chicken coop for several months – give or take a month or two. At any rate, your children now refuse to go out to the coop, complaining of a foul odor. You haven’t graced it for weeks (for that very same reason, though you won’t admit it to the kids), and are groaning at the chore of washing those disgusting eggs every evening. (Yes, for those of you who don’t realize it, the eggs do come out in the same area as the waste.) All of this is an omen of one thing – the chicken coop must be cleaned.
It begins on Saturday. Announce it to your family at dinner on Friday and tell your two oldest children that they are your helpers. Arguing and complaining will follow, but at least the job is dealt out. (If you happen to have children visiting from Belarus at coop cleaning time as we once did, don’t bother asking them; they feel it beneath their social status to do such things.)
On Saturday, remind the kids throughout the morning that the chicken coop will be cleaned today. Take them out there at about ten, and make sure they are wearing old clothes along with their boots from the store. All of you should wear gloves. Take either your tractor or riding lawn mower with the trailer attachment and park it outside the door of the chicken coop. Bring along a flat-bladed shovel and two five-gallon buckets. Do not be surprised if arguments arise about who will scrape the doo and who will dump the buckets. Both are smelly and dirty jobs, which you will not have to do if you delegate both to the kids.
Let me describe in detail: one child must use the flat-bladed shovel to scrape out the wood chips and dung mix, put it in the bucket, and repeat the process until the bucket is full. He will be working in the enclosed foul air of the chicken coop for about half an hour after the fighting stops. You may want to consider handing out an optional dust mask for this child, as the dust in the chicken coop is usually an inch thick.
The next child must take the bucket of dung and dump it into the trailer or tractor bucket. This may heap quite high, depending on the amount of square feet on your chicken coop floor. The person doing this job will want to dump out their boots every once in a while, particularly if they are a messy “dumper”.
The cycle continues until all of the waste is out of the coop. Then your job is to drive the tractor or lawn mower out to the designated place for the compost heap and dump the waste on it. (The compost heap is best placed in the corner of your property nearest your most difficult neighbor.)
Now the coop is clean, but your nose will not recognize that until you put a layer of fresh wood chips over the floor. Ignore the inevitable complaints about this job, and forget about the coop for three months until you again recognize the classic symptoms of a messy chicken coop.
