05-19-2024 Harford Magazine - Flipbook - Page 24
The room is filled with vintage chicken-related
keepsakes, from ceramics to glassware to
paintings.
Each show begins with a rooster’s hearty
crow. That’s the sound of Ricardo Montalban,
a 15-pound Jersey Giant, now deceased.
“We’ve immortalized him in the podcast,”
DiCarlo said.
To date, the show has followers in 131
countries (“That’s people, though some might
also be listening with their chickens,” CallahanKasmala said) and has received nearly 250
reviews on Apple. They comb the world —
England, Africa and New Zealand — seeking
experts for fowl talk. They boast seven national
sponsors, all hawking chicken-related products.
The hosts themselves peddle T-shirts, tank tops
and mugs bearing the podcast’s logo, a pastoral
watercolor of the two of them sitting blissfully
outside, in Adirondack chairs, surrounded by
hens and a wooden coop.
Increasingly, they’ve appeared at conferences
and county fairs, from Iowa to Alabama. Why
do the chicken ladies cross the road? To share
their know-how on pets that peck.
Most of the show’s audience, like chickens,
is female.
“Women and poultry have a long history
together,” Callahan-Kasmala said. “Through
World War II, women were responsible for
farm animal care.”
Not all who tune in own hens; some are
mulling the prospect. More than one has
offered, “I don’t have chickens but I love
listening because you make me happy.”
Each episode offers recipes that use eggs
(NOT chickens), such as souffles, muffins and
stuffing. Another favorite topic: breeds that
lay off-colored eggs (blue, green and pink) —
though, truth be told, all fresh eggs taste the
same.
But it’s when the hosts share tales of their
own flocks that the podcast takes off. Both
women name their chickens; Agatha Christie,
Ruth Bader Ginsberg and Frances Hodgson
Burnett scratch for grubs in Callahan-Kasmala’s
backyard.
“They are fast and careful hunters,” she said.
“I have hens that will jump and snatch a moth
from the air faster than you can blink.”
Pshaw, said DiCarlo.
“I have chickens that have eaten a snake, a
mouse and a frog.”
Among her favorites was a hen named
Gertie, “one of the most charismatic chickens
I’ve ever had. Gertie was very alpha and wanted
to be around people, or she’d give a pterodactyl
scream like nothing you’ve ever heard.
“I used to take her to Independent Brewing,
in Bel Air, where she’d sit outside with us, in her
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stroller, while my husband and I had a beer. It’s
personalities like hers that get you sucked into
chicken keeping.”
For Callahan-Kasmala, the “light-bulb
moment” came early in her hen-raising pursuit.
“I wondered why nobody ever told me how
amazing these little featherballs are,” she said.
“They’re funny, smart and affectionate. I never
knew that a hen would get in your lap and go
to sleep, or make little crying sounds.
“Research has shown that a chicken’s brain is
like a little computer chip, and that [the animal]
has about the same mental capacity as a 7-yearold child. It can recognize more than 100 faces,
and has complex social bonds.”
Off their temperament, it’s hard not to
personify chickens, DiCarlo said. Consider
Cornelia, one in her brood who has shown
a willingness to share a meal with her owner.
“Given food, she calls me to come and share
it with her,” she said. “Cornelia makes a high-
Some of the chickens belonging to Chrisie
DiCarlo lounge together. DiCarlo, right, and Holly
Callahan-Kasmala started a weekly podcast about
chickens during the pandemic.
pitched ‘to-to-to’ sound, called tidbitting, which
means, ‘Hey, there’s some good stuff over here.’ “
The treats being black soldier fly grubs,
DiCarlo declines. But the podcast audience
eats up such stuff.
“Listeners tell us it’s more relaxing to
watch their chickens than TV,” she said. “It’s a
de-stresser for us to see them dig, or eat, and
they never stop moving. It’s a very calming
thing to watch, like [pet] fish.”
Both women devoutly bury their hens in
the yard when they die. And while they’ve not
addressed that subject on air, it’s in the offing.
“We haven’t yet done a podcast on grief,”
DiCarlo said. “But if people reach out to us,
we’re there for them.”
