Tuesday, December 7, 2010

No eating each other!

The addition of the new "livestock" to the basement farm has created some interesting ethical issues. The other day I ran out of mealworms, so without even thinking about it, I went to the vermaculture bin dug out a worm and threw it in the chicken pen. The chickens were thrilled and the one girl who got the worm looked pleased while the others gave me pathetic hungry stares. I turned to walk away from the pen, to see my mom standing there with a look of shock on her face! She does have a point that it is kinda mean to ship the worms all the way here from Pennsylvania and then just pull them out of their new wonderful home and feed them to three diva chickens. It is a "cruel and very unusual" way for a little worm to meet his maker. (I am not sure how this worm dying is any different from the mealworms I bought at the pet store, but I didn't press that issue.)  The moral of the story is there is a new rule on our urban homestead: no eating each other! What a strange life we live.....