Poultry Endeavours and Diabolical Deeds

A reflection on the ups and downs of 2024

This year felt like the challenging times of trying to run a small business during COVID lockdowns, but without the government support. We’ve all been hit hard by the cost-of-living crisis. Whether you’re a renter, you have an astronomical mortgage, or you own a portfolio of investment properties, the impact of rising interest rates and skyrocketing inflation has rippled right through the economy. It’s made it a tough year for small businesses like mine to stay afloat. Like many of my readers, my family has been tightening its purse strings and carefully considering every purchase.

I run a lot of workshops for councils and community groups. They pay well and I use them to subsidise my less profitable work, which is pretty much the rest of what I do. Working with councils is very seasonal – none of them run workshops in December or January because no one would turn up. May and September tend to be the busiest time for this work, and I need to make hay while the sun shines. At the start of May, I managed to run eight workshops and events in 10 days. I also threw in a few consults for good measure. Some of these events were local to me, others ran in Melbourne. Regardless of how far I needed to travel, each workshop took a great deal of preparation. By the end of the 10 days, I was broken. Really broken.

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If Santa slipped some sneaky cash into your Christmas stocking this year, why not re-gift it and take out an annual subscription to my newsletter?

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A tickle in the back of my throat had manifested into something much more sinister. I battled a chest infection and pneumonia for over two months and ended up in hospital. Suddenly even the smallest tasks required effort. After just an hour of weeding I was cooked, exhausted. It’s only now that I’ve bounced back, and can work a full day again, that I realise how sick I was.

I’m not good at sitting still. I hated having to rest. Fortunately, that enforced downtime from physical work enabled me to focus on writing. I also read plenty of books, finally having the time to delve deeply into all things weather.

To help with day-to-day expenses and to teach the kids about the value of money, we upgraded our egg stall. During peak laying times, such as spring, we’ve always put an old cooler down by the main road and sold excess eggs via an honesty payment system. This year, I built a shelter to keep the sun off the cooler and allow us to sell other items such as fruit and seedlings.

Our attempt to teach the kids about the value of money. Now when the kids start asking to buy stuff, we can tell them that book costs three dozen eggs, or that new football will cost you eight bags of lemons.

Initially the egg stall was a roaring success. We couldn’t keep up with demand for the eggs, and bags of citrus also sold well. So I put out some strawberry plants that I’d propagated. They were also popular, but a few plants went missing without payment left. No big deal, I thought, times are tough, I get it. The odd bit of dishonesty is to be expected. The culprit probably needs the money more than I do.

I also propagated a lot of extra tomato seedlings to sell on the stall. I did this after Spike the echidna trashed a pallet of potting mix bags. I thought I’d use all the otherwise unsaleable potting mix to propagate tomatoes to sell.

Not again, Spike! This was the second time Spike trashed my potting mix stash. After the first effort, I thought I had barricaded it well enough, but an echidna is like a tank. There’s very little you can do to stop a determined echidna. The remaining bags have now been relocated into a more secure shed.

One weekend in late September, I put many tomato plants for sale on the stall. Just like toilet paper circa 2020, they flew off the shelf and I needed to replenish stock every few hours. By the end of the weekend 84 plants had found new homes. Unfortunately, only 23 had been paid for. This pattern was repeated over the next few weeks. Bags of citrus would go missing, or worse, someone would take one or two lemons from a bag, peel and eat them there and then throw the peel on the ground next to the stall. Eating lemons is strange enough behaviour, just take the whole damned bag, please.

Not many eggs were stolen though. I was surprised, I thought it would have been the other way around, with more food and fewer seedlings stolen. I thought people who grow their own food are too honest to steal; that they see value in rewarding folks for their hard work. Apparently not.

Not all the thieves stole outright, though. Some folks took a dozen eggs and left us the contents of their centre console: old coins, dust and a few crumbs from a long-ago-consumed drive-thru meal. Sometimes we hit the jackpot and there’d be a bonus 80 cents. More often though, these centre console bandits left us far short of the asking price. Near enough is good enough, apparently.

I’ve since spoken with a few other folks who have dabbled with roadside and farmgate stalls. They’ve experienced similar levels of theft. Seriously, who’d grow food to sell these days? It’s a sure-fire way to start hating the world. Imagine working your guts out to produce nutrient-dense, delicious food to sell, only to earn the equivalent of 75 cents an hour.

Concerned for my own mental health, I ripped the stall down and placed a smaller version near our front gate where we could keep a close eye on it. We are situated on a corner block at the intersection of a main road and a much quieter dead-end lane. The original egg stall was down the front of the property on the busier road. The new stall near our front gate sees far less traffic. We don’t sell anywhere near as much produce, but there’s been zero theft since the move. The absence of theft makes it more fun and once again sends a positive message to the kids. More importantly, we’ve enjoyed the interactions we’ve had with our neighbours.

And this is where the story (finally) takes a turn for the better (thanks for your patience). Folks leave empty egg cartons, notes and flowers, and someone once left us a surprise visitor.

One night Mrs Egg appeared in our roadside stall. We’ve since had much fun with her, providing updates to the locals. We even received a letter from the anonymous donor.

Chatting with neighbours, sharing produce, helping each other out, that’s where it’s at. Thanks to our egg stall shenanigans my family is fostering an even stronger connection to those living around us. We’re part of a vibrant local network, not just with our immediate neighbours, but with many other local organisations. It is this connection to the community that provides our family with a foundation of strength and resilience.

You, my good reader, are an extension of my local network community. I show up every week with a carefully crafted article for you to read. In return you support me with your comments and camaraderie. We ask each other questions and receive eager answers in return. I’ve been doing this for ten years now and I love it. Thanks for joining me on my journey and for your ongoing support.

From my family to yours, have a fantastic year in 2025. May it be full of gardening, personal growth and fun times.

Duncan, Caryn, Angus and Emily