Even though it may not have been widely reported until today, is it surprising that someone in Bushwick has opened a chicken sanctuary? The NY Post looks in on the brood of 19 chickens and one duck happily roosting at a makeshift farm in the neighborhood (which has been around for a while now). They report back that the birds "sleep in a weatherized wood coop, play on a jungle gym, nap in the sun, eat organic greens," and when they come down with a chicken cold (it happens!) they are given herbal remedies.
One 26-year-old at the farm, Masha Radzinsky, says, "They get a lot of love." And they give a lot of love, too! Or at least, nourishment. The chickens—some of which were rescued form the city's live poultry markets—produce about 80 eggs every two weeks, which are then passed out for free to locals. Everything they grow there, in fact, is free. They note on their website, "We collaborate with property-owners for the free availability of their space and in turn everything that the Farm provides is also free. We operate solely on a 'give what you can, take only what you need,' basis."
The farm is located at 897 Broadway, and used to be nothing more than a depressing vacant lot. Maybe we get to those vertical farms we should work more on transforming more vacant lots. Late last year one of the founders told BushwickBK, "We want to establish a whole network of farms in Bushwick and East New York. So if anyone knows of an abandoned lot…"
