There has been high activity since the New Moon. I held a fun flower essence workshop at Berea Urban Farm; Megan Martin from BUF has helped me bring bees and a Queen to the hive where the Queen died; we’ve welcomed two kittens to our home; we published our campsite offering on hipcamp; a dear friend is about to give birth; and we culled our ducks.
Today I went to share with the bees about the ducks. Of course the experience was challenging, with the full spectrum of emotions. I was their loving mother figure, and also their death bringer, returning them into the darkness. Holding this dichotomy within us has been something my husband, Phil, and I have been contending with since the first day they arrived as ducklings.
We had bought eight males and six females, knowing that we would be killing and sending seven males to the freezer. We decided to wait until eight weeks, but we seemed to be a week late, as the males began to challenge each other and some of them had begun to molt, making de-feathering more challenging.
We prepared the supplies and gathered a group of dear friends who were interested in supporting this process. We were very fortunate that Aurora’s Grammy and Auntie were able to hang out with her as we had our hands full of blood, feathers, organs, and entrails.
We did a practice kill and butcher a few days prior to ensure our plan for the day of death. We caught the Silver Appleyard and put him upside down in the cone. Phil took a knife to his neck, as Aurora and I fed the ducks farther away in the yard. Blood dripped down, and then we scrambled to process the duck before dinner. It was a terrible experience, with a lot of anger coming up—not a good idea while trying to tend to our two year-old and still needing to prepare dinner as the sun was closing for the day.
That night, however, in between waking and sleeping, I felt a deep awareness of how much closer I had become with the Earth, as though we were meant to take on this initiation to be in deeper connection. I woke feeling stronger, powerful, and more human.
The day came for us to gather with our group. As we circled to offer our gratitude, we became ready. I’m a moralist, so I prayed asking the Earth and my inner guidance if what we are about to do is “okay”. I received that we are now taking responsibility for the meat that supports us, and it is helpful to balance out the energies of the Earth. When people take back that responsibility, there are fewer overstocked, unhealthy living conditions that occur in “mass production.” The animals and the humans who are involved with those types of conditions lessen their load and it is easier to breathe.
Even with feeling this in my bones, watching them chatter their teeth in fear when we would go to harvest the next duck made this responsibility extremely challenging.
The bees had shared to hold the ducks in love, and in loving grace they would go. I sang, and gently held them as I took the knife to their throats, and as they bled out I continued to gently lay my hands on them and sing. They shook, twitched, and released, but eventually, a tranquility came over them, and I could feel it too. Their spirit had left. It was silent. It was peaceful.
Without being taught any rituals to perform this work, I took some on myself with my intuition. These rituals were sacred, and empowered me to treat them as I imagined they should be honored. It seemed as though these rituals were received and as it is when any being comes and goes from the darkness, there are more forces than just ourselves involved.
While we were butchering in the driveway, an adolescent deer came bounding up to the parked cars, and then disappeared—a very strange occurrence as there were many people around and it was the middle of the day. After we finished our work, ate a feast, and rested into the afternoon, a storm so intense came through it felt as though the energy of the Universe had shifted, even if just a hair.
The next day we noticed that we were gifted a giant valuable Black Walnut tree that had fallen in an ideal location. It was in the field over the path, and there on the path, right in front of the giant tree, was a single deer footprint.
So today, as I spoke with the bees, updating them on the events since the New Moon, I felt into the sadness that we went through killing our ducks, who left the remaining ducks behind. It took them a few days to work through their own emotions around their kin leaving them. But now they are feeding from our hands again, chasing the kittens, and waiting for food scraps out our back door.
I want to acknowledge that after the very first day of Phil and I butchering the first duck, I wanted to hide away in a New York high-rise and work at some corporate entity, eat at the finest restaurants, and not have anything to do with living the way we do. But that feeling was fleeting as we were deeply moved. Being with our community and going through this process together has been sacred, and fills me with a connection and deep sense of worth I could not find by hiding away from the truth of what it takes to eat an animal.
So intense, yet so real when we remember our primal blueprint and the responsibility of LIFE in our hands as we fed our family. My sweetheart and I speak a lot about having animals to harvest, and I struggle with how my heart feels in that choice. Thank You for sharing your experience and reflections.