I agree. I have an almost 2 year old and we have a few pets here already (dog, fish & ferret) and I can see her little brain slowly coming to terms with them and their place in the world. I think that is extremely important.

A ‘gateway animal’ is a great name for them! We have already seen our amounts of waste reduced a lot since we compost / worm all our organics and hopefully I can start composting / worming (for lack of a better term) more of our paper waste too while keeping the chooks fed and us with eggs! Its almost too easy!

We got chooks last year, and they’re awesome. I’m surprised too that more people don’t keep them. I’ve already convinced three people at work to get some.

I see chooks as a “gateway animal” that start people thinking about sustainability, where their scraps go, where their food comes from, how animals are treated, etc. They’re a great way to teach children about all that stuff as well, not to mention some responsibility in helping to care for them.