Which Came Frist? The Chicken Or The Worm?

Since I started gardening and becoming more aware of the food waste we produce, I've been thinking about how I can get the most out of it all. I have a compost pile out back, but since it's a cold pile that currently houses ants, I haven't put food in it yet. This got me thinking about worm composting called "vermicomposting." You can read more about it here and here. As I read through the book, "Worms Eat My Garbage," by Mary Appelhof, I began to ask myself, "Would the volume of our food waste going into a worm bin produce enough of a result to make it worth while?" Sure, worm castings are awesome for the garden soil, but it doesn't seem like the quickest of processes to me.

Our city participates in a great recycling system, and I can continue to put our food scraps into our yard bin for pick up, but what do I get from this but the knowledge and satisfaction that I'm doing some good for our local environment? Sorry for being selfish, but I want the most out of the money I put into my food.

This brings me to the chickens. I don't know how the idea originally popped into my head that I could be a chicken owner. I thought about it once last year. When I mentioned it in passing to DH, he laughed and rolled his eyes at yet another of my silly ideas. I had to agree with him. It seemed too impractical for me and this rented yard. But somewhere along the reading of blogs, I read about someone feeding their kitchen scraps to their chickens. *Gasp* Could this be how I could use my scraps? I put food in, and eggs out, and the chicken poo is great for my garden!

In my never-ending quest to find more garden bloggers in my area, and to feed my chicken curiosity, I used Blotanical's search function to see what "chicken" would give me. The first result yielded the blog of Love Apple Farm, situated in the south bay area (about 90 minutes from me), and their post offering backyard chicken-keeping classes this May and September. Not only will they teach me how to care for chickens in my backyard, but I'll get to go home with 3 lovely chicks and a brooder kit! I did a little homework to confirm whether or not I can have chickens in my yard, then brought the idea up to DH. Boy, was I shocked when he was on board! His only warning is that they go the moment he steps in their poo. HAHA! That's it?

In the past 5 days, I have been obsessed with chickens. I'm loosing sleep over the idea of chickens. I've found sites here and here, and blogs here and here devoted to keeping backyard chickens. Not to mention the garden blogs I already read who's owners have chickens. I visited the library, and blew through the only book the had available, "The Backyard Poulty Book" (it wasn't difficult since most of the info from 1979 is outdated and irrelevant). Next I proceeded to add Amazon's Kindle app to my iphone so I could instantly read "Storey's Guide to Raising Chickens," which is really good so far.

Am I crazy for wanting to owns chickens when the only things I ever owned were a gerbil and goldfish? All I know is I have a month or two to figure it all out, to come up with an explination to the landlord (she's pretty nice and carefree), and decide if this is a good thing for me to do, or if I should stick with the worm plan...