Something I’ve discovered with owning a farm is the tendency to want to hoard items seems to increase with each passing year.

Oh, I’m not talking about the kind of stuff that the popular show “Hoarders” has featured with garbage piled up or clothing, boxes, etc.

What I’m talking about is the useful farm stuff, like bailing twine, which is good to have on hand in case something needs tied together. That stray piece of tin? It’s great for creating an awning at the door of a coop so the blowing storms don’t wet everything inside.

Over the past six years on the farm, I’ve managed to collect stray lumber, pulleys, chain, fencing, posts, you name it. If someone was tossing something out and I had the inkling that I just might need it in the future, I kept it. After all, a little space in the barn for an item that may be a saving grace in the future seemed a small price.

This is definitely not how I originally approached owning the farm. At the beginning, I was clearing out as much stuff as I could, reducing the number of “sit around” items. Now, I find I’m just as guilty with collecting as the farmer before me. It’s rather comforting to know that should I need a short 2×4 for a small project, all I have to do is go to the lumber pile, select the board that will work best and voila.

Yard sales and auctions are the best locations for finding that item I just know will be useful in the future. A couple of years ago, I stopped at a yard sale where there was a small chest-type cooler for $3. Now, I typically send my meat birds to a processor and don’t have to worry about having enough containers to transport the packaged poultry, but you know I just might wish I had an extra cooler in the future, and at the price, I couldn’t pass it up.

I brought the cooler home and placed it on a garage shelf, where it sat for two years. When each time arrived to pull the larger coolers down to transport poultry, I would shove this little cooler out of the way and think I needed to get rid of it, but I just couldn’t bear to do it. I just might need it.

Fast forward to the incessant heat wave we’ve been in recently and my need to try and keep the feathered ladies as comfortable as possible. A crazy thought entered my head as I grew more stressed about the heat that “Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have air conditioning in the coop?”

Well, let me tell you, a quick search on YouTube for DIY air conditioning and a quick inventory on what I had on hand and I’m here to tell you there is now air conditioning in the large chicken coop. That little cooler was exactly what I needed along with a small turbo-type fan to give the ladies the ultimate in creature comforts during the sweltering heat. So much for clearing things out.

Though, watching the girls gather around the apparatus is rather adorable. I mean, who could blame them with having to wear little down coats year-round. The things I do for these crazy cluckers.

Until next time…