Rise and Shine, Farmer! A Day in the Life of a Chicken Keeper
The rooster doesn’t care what time you went to bed last night. His job is to crow at the crack of dawn—or, let’s be honest, sometimes hours before dawn—and your job is to rise and shine whether you’re ready or not. That’s life as a chicken keeper: alarm clocks optional, roosters mandatory.
The day begins with a sleepy shuffle out to the coop, coffee in one hand and feed bucket in the other. The moment the latch clicks, it’s like opening the gates at a rock concert. Chickens come bursting out, flapping, clucking, and strutting like they’ve been waiting all night for this moment. Nugget, the loudest of the bunch, always makes her grand entrance first, while Beatrice insists on inspecting the feed scoop before anyone else can touch it.
Breakfast is chaos. You’d think after being fed every single morning of their lives, the chickens would trust that food is coming. But no. They act like it’s a limited-time buffet that might disappear forever if they don’t elbow their way to the front. By the time everyone’s pecking happily, I’ve usually got at least one feather stuck to my sweatshirt and mud (or something suspiciously similar) on my boots.
The rest of the day is a mix of chores and comedy. There’s egg collecting, which sounds simple until you realize some hens refuse to use the nesting boxes. Instead, they hide their eggs in corners, behind hay bales, or once—no joke—inside an old boot. Then there’s coop cleaning, which is less “glamorous farmer” and more “professional shoveler of things no one wants to talk about.” And of course, there’s chicken wrangling when someone decides the grass really is greener on the other side of the fence.
But in between the mess, there are golden moments. Like the way the sun hits their feathers in the afternoon, turning the coop into a runway of sparkling colors. Or the sound of soft clucking as they settle down for dust baths, looking more relaxed than any human at a spa. Or the satisfaction of carrying a basket of fresh, warm eggs into the kitchen, knowing exactly where your breakfast came from.
By evening, the girls are ready to roost. Getting them inside the coop can feel like herding toddlers at bedtime—some go willingly, some drag their feet, and one always insists she’s not tired yet. Once the door is latched and the farm is quiet, I finally get to breathe, laugh at the day’s chaos, and maybe even put my feet up… until tomorrow morning, when the rooster starts it all over again.
Being a chicken keeper isn’t glamorous. It’s muddy, noisy, unpredictable, and sometimes exhausting. But it’s also full of joy, laughter, and little reminders that the simple life often brings the biggest rewards.
Because at the end of the day, there’s nothing quite like rising with the sun and realizing your flock is counting on you—and in their own feathery, chaotic way, they make every single morning worth it.
