Flown the Coop

“BAWK BAWK” is all the Seabury chickens say if asked how they like their home. They would not respond in English, because they are chickens. Despite their poor public speaking skills, chickens have long been a feature of Bishop Seabury. Students enjoy hanging out around the chicken coop in the far reaches of campus. 

Now, however, students visiting the chicken coop will find nothing but construction, perhaps a few feathers and remembered cries floating on the wind. This begs the question: where are the Seabury chickens? 

“Senor Rowe took them to a secret chicken sanctuary,” says eighth grader Owen Diederich when asked what he thinks happened to the birds. That rumor is one of several floating around the school. Some students have posited that the chickens became nuggets and were served at lunch, or were eaten by the Griggs family. 

In response to Diederich’s accusations, faculty member Scott Rowe says, “I can neither confirm nor deny such allegations. Next question.” Rowe has a counter-theory for what happened. He believes PETA took them in the dead of night. “If an animal had gotten them, there would have been feathers left behind. But you know what PETA says, ‘no feather left behind.’ And there were no feathers. So I think it was PETA,” Rowe says. 

However, these are just outlandish rumors. One student knows precisely where the Seabury chickens are. “They’re at my house!” says seventh grader Eliza Brockhoff. The chickens moved to the Brockhoff family’s farm this summer. “They are currently living in a pen that is mostly plants, where they live in a chicken kingdom underneath the leaves,” she says. Brockhoff loves caring for the chickens and has even memorized their names: “Spider, Inky, Midnight, Little Red, Sparky and Creme Brulee.”

According to Brockhoff, the chickens left due to construction: “It’s very stressful for chickens to be around loud noises and just confusing sounds in their environment, and it could make them sick.” 

Faculty member Cris Bryan, who helps run the COOP Club, says logistics were also a factor: “We knew that with construction the coop was going to have to be moved and that was going to be a hassle.” 

The chickens appear happy in their new home. “We give them treats, and they get their outdoor play space, and they get to run around and eat bugs,” Brockhoff says. Their pen is surrounded by electrical poultry netting, which keeps out coyotes and other predators. 

Still, students like senior Logan Mathis miss them. “In Creative Writing, sometimes I’d go out and write by the chicken coop,” she says. “[The chickens] were super loud but it was still nice. . . I was just so used to having them around. When they were gone I just felt a little sad.” Diederich agrees with Mathis, saying he liked petting them. For many students, the chickens provided a peaceful, wholesome place outside during the school day. 

The chickens also lured teachers outdoors. “I went out there pretty often just to have a look and see how everybody was doing,” says Bryan.“[It was] an opportunity to talk about them with the students, but also sometimes I’d go out and somebody had let them out free-ranging, and I always thought that was fun that they wanted to watch the chickens run around.”

As most Seabury students live in town and cannot have animals of their own, the chickens at Seabury add an opportunity to learn what caring for animals requires. “They added a sense of responsibility, and it was kind of cool for people who live in the city to experience something they otherwise wouldn’t,” Brockhoff says. 

On this point, Bryan agrees: “It’s nice to have some animals you can watch and observe, especially something not everybody has at their house, but it’s also the idea of taking care of something. Just the responsibility it is. Also, we’re producing food, and that’s kind of cool too!”

Before the chickens’ big move, the Seabury COOP Club cared for them and the garden. The COOP Club started in 2013. Bryan looks forward to replanting the garden and getting more chickens. “The coop is where it’s going to be, and this spring, when the sixth graders hatch their chicks, they can get us some new chickens. Then maybe we’ll have some eggs by the fall,” Bryan says. 

Although the Seabury coop is temporarily empty, the old flock is not forgotten by the students whose lives it touched. A new batch of chickens will soon take up residence. Although they also will not be able to speak, one can only hope the chickens know that they are loved, feathers and all.