On Saturday (October 19, to be precise) I awoke to the clinging and a-clanging of a mobile cellular tele-phone message from Bull City Bucks (a great way to earn free mess in Durham, NC). This aforementioned alert alertly alerted me to some alerting news; it was time for the third annual Bull City Coop Tour!

After rounding up the missus, we peeled out of the driveway to go get our $5 map from Bull City Burger n’ Brewery (they also offered maps at the Durham Farmers’ Market). With el mapa en la mano, we were off on this journey of chickens and learning.

If you haven’t yet been on the Bull City Coop Tour, it’s a lot like the Henside the Beltline: Tour D’Coop in Raleigh, only it’s in Durham. Basically, it’s a tour of backyard chicken coops, given by their owners. I’d heartily suggest you chiggity check it out.

This year there were 9 chicken coop stops on the map. At each place you get to meet the owners (who dish out a steaming bowl of chicken knowledge) and also see some great homemade chicken coops, gardens (hydroponic and more conventional), beehives, and even get some free home-grown mint tea.

Plus, you get to see all the different birds (from lil’ quails to bantam chickens to Silkie chickens to Barred Plymouth Rocks). At some places you can hold them, or just listen as they peck around and squabble with one another.

So if you like exploring new parts of Durham, meeting new peeps (chickens AND people), and getting educated on chickens n’ chicken raising, take out your Sharpie©™ marker and scrawl a big X on your calendar (sometime next October?) for next year’s Bull City Coop Tour. Don’t forget to tell them EcoJoe sent you; they’ll surely be impressed!

P.S. You might want to stop by the ChickenStock Festival following the Bull City Coop Tour, at Bull City Burger.

For your viewing pleasure, here are some photographs from the third annual Bull City Coop Tour: