The eggs and us

A classic Northwest story (and fantasy) is re-enacted on a run-down farm on Lopez Island

By Gardiner Davis

The San Juan Islands have become a rural escape for the very rich and others who will pay $40 to get their car on the ferry. There was a time when they were “undiscovered.” The agricultural value of the land in the early 1970s wasn’t much — four or five hundred bucks an acre — and if you had other sources of income and the time, you could act like a farmer and raise chickens or sheep or horses. This was an attractive lifestyle for my young family of six.

Lopez Island in those days had a few farmers and commercial fishermen, whose families had been “Lopezians” for generations and still worked and lived there. The look of the place had not changed for a hundred years: gently rolling hayfields bordered by woods. Seattle’s economy was still dominated by “Boeings.” Downtown Seattle considered itself grand with two pricy Italian restaurants (Rosellini's 410 and 610) and a couple of steak and chop houses. The Seattle Symphony was mediocre. There was little theatre. The sidewalks were empty by 8 at night. Bill Gates (a teenager) was a student of mine at Lakeside School, where I taught English.

My grandmother had died and left me some money. Big surprise! Let’s buy a farm! Why not? So, true to our impulsive selves, we bought the first place the real estate agent showed us. No one had lived there for several years. The vegetation had grown exponentially and the place had a softened feel. My wife, Gwenyth, loved it at first sight and I went along. There was a house and several outbuildings, large and small, that, in the surprising afternoon’s slanted sunlight at the end of a cloudy day, delighted me while I was looking at the place. It was glorious. I was reminded of Wyeth watercolors.

I was the perfect patsy for this place. Right after I had signed the papers, I was leaning against one of the mossy split-cedar fence posts, admiring the whole thing, when the post snapped off at the ground. I almost fell flat on my face. The nearer posts, attached to the rusted barbed wire, sagged and I soon realized that they were all rotten. But they had looked so good! Lesson one: what you see is not necessarily what you get. We had yet to discover the chimney plugged with a bird’s nest, the solidified septic tank, and the earthy-tasting water from the shallow dug well.

Back in Seattle, Gwen and I thought, “Let’s start with chickens.” I concurred. She found an ag magazine and ordered some.

This is what happens when you buy day-old-chicks through the mail. The chick producer calls you the morning they ship to be sure that you will be there to receive them. The day-old chicks arrived in the hands of our postman in what looked like a very large pizza box, with vents. In the box were 50 New Jersey Giants, at these stage only little balls of yellow fluff. They were peeping away, I thought maybe trying to figure out where they had fetched up. The postman was shaken and gladly handed the box over to my wife.

“Man, am I ever glad to be rid of this,” he said to Gwen, who had her arms out to receive the carton. “I been driving around with it in the back of my truck all morning and I just know that what’s in there is alive.”

Gwen took the box from him, walked into the kitchen, and cautiously opened it. Baby chicks, alive alive O, making peeping and whistling sounds, they were, already pecking for something to eat. The fact that the cardboard gave up no nutrients whatsoever hinted both at the chick’s pre-programmed behavior and their limited intelligence. Nothing suggested that they would become Giants, from New Jersey or anyplace else.

But they might just do well at the derelict farm on Lopez Island. Neither of us had ever raised chickens. This did not daunt our enthusiasm. We sent for literature from the local County Agent of the Department of Agriculture. I bought a huge stockman’s manual and found plans for a fenced-in chicken coop. We would have fresh eggs. What would happen to the chickens at the end of the summer when school resumed? Question unasked. Why did we think we needed 50 eggs a day? I have no idea.

As we watched these miraculous babies it became apparent that of the 50 chicks shipped from the producer, only 49 were up and running. One had keeled over. Surrounded by all the other chicks that cared not a peep that it was there, it lay still, with its eyes closed, out cold on the floor of the pizza box.

It looked dead to me but I had never before seen a dead chick. I had read that new-born chicks need warmth, and it being a chilly April day, guessed one had succumbed to chick hypothermia. Without hesitation (but with slightly rising gorge) I picked up the dead chick by its little leg and said, “I will dispose of it.” I started to walk toward the garbage pail.