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Friendly flock aids gardening By RON NEWBERRY
A SUPPLEMENT TO THE WHIDBEY NEWS-TIMES, SOUTH WHIDBEY RECORD AND THE WHIDBEY EXAMINER
Diane Tompkinson can talk chicken with the best of the backyard poultry farmers. A retired educator, Tompkinson has raised chickens for 23 years, partly for what they do for her own well-being and also for her vegetable garden. The hens that strut around Tompkinson’s Coupeville property produce healthier and tastier eggs than those found in cold storage in stores, she contends. The chickens’ manure also packs a mighty punch to add to her compost piles to perk up her edible garden. And she finds that chickens like to peck at bugs, proving to be invaluable in controlling insects as part of her organic gardening practices. “When I first started raising them I liked being part of the complete cycle of the garden,” Tompkinson said. “The chicken produces the eggs. Their fertilizer was thrown into the garden. It went to the vegetables and the excess (vegetables) went back to the chickens. The perfect cycle.” Tompkinson’s chickens might be among the healthiest and most nutritious broods on Whidbey Island because of their diet. Their feed includes the excess from the organic vegetables in her garden and seven fruit trees. “Most people can’t afford to give chicken tons of kale, collard, spinach and apples,” Tompkinson said. “I’m still feeding them from last year’s harvest, plus some fresh greens. That puts my chickens at a great advantage in terms of flavor.” Regarding their eggs, that is. Tompkinson doesn’t raise chickens to eat them, only for the harmony they bring to her garden and for their eggs. She sells her eggs for $6 a dozen, which is a couple bucks higher than the going price among poultry raisers on the island. “I’m still sold out most of the time,” she said. When you can control the types of fertilizer that go into your garden and the sort of feed that goes into your chickens, a noticeable difference is found in flavor and nutrition of the eggs, Tompkinson contends. And she’s hardly alone in this belief. Louise Mueller has raised chickens on her Coupeville property for more than 60 years and likes to let her chickens range freely. She sees them grazing on her grass and knows that the more greens in their diets, the better the eggs. “The more greens they get, the more orange the yoke,” Mueller said. “The more orange the yoke, the more Vitamin A is in the yoke.” SEE FLOCK, PAGE 2