Just found a great article on my favorite legal humor site, "Lowering the Bar". The author surpasses himself in his analysis of certain features of backyard-chicken legislation.
Quote:
http://www.loweringthebar.net/2011/04/new-jersey-township-passes-chicken-sex-rule.html
http://www.squidoo.com/the-trouble-with-roosters
Come on by and see my first Squidoo Lens, which is about the practical and ethical problems of "surprise" roosters. If you like it, clicking the "SquidLike" button on the left would help me. Thanks!
A set of vintage ceramic salt and pepper shakers, designed like no chicken ever seen on earth! I think it's a rooster...
PM me to order, or order on my website:
http://www.mulewagon.com/product/rooster-chicken-salt-pepper-shakers
I'm keeping my two Buff Orpington roosters in separate small pens this winter, to give the hens a chance to recover and re-feather. Each boy gets a walk on alternate days in the evening, when the girls free-range.
My question is, what quantity of feed do they need when penned up? With free...
I hope that somebody can see what we're missing, here. Many thanks to anyone who can help!
We've just set up a two-strand electric fence around the chicken pen. It's plugged into an extension cord from the house. The light on the controller comes on, but the tester shows no current. (And...
The worst is true - I can see this morning that there's a giant oak tree down across my pen. The fence is crushed, also the broody coop (no one is brooding,thank goodness!)
I think the coop is still intact. I hope we can get to it in time, it's full of babies an both the roosters are in...
I dunno - started this broody out with a dozen eggs. About a week ago, saw her with a black face and found a broken shell. I assumed she had accidentally broken the egg, and eaten the chick to keep the nest clean.
Then I heard peeping yesterday, and saw one new-hatched chick - left them...
My little brood of eleven chicks is down to four today. No blood, no signs, the adult birds are fine - they just vanished overnight from the pen. SNAKES! And a big one, too, to eat seven chicks at a sitting.
So I headed out to WalMart to get minnow traps (kicking myself because I should have...
Okay, I haven't seen them. Yet. The UPS driver just told me that a bear had been sighted last week in Boaz, about ten miles north of us, and one about two weeks ago in Whitesboro. We had last heard of one on our own property, about ten years ago - the neighbor spotted it.
This is on top of...
I was indoors, checking out BYC , when I heard my normally quiet puppy barking and growling right outside my window. Went to check, and there's a four-foot chicken snake across the front walk! Badger and I circled it while I thought frantically. I had to get it out of there before it found...
I was just about to open the gate to the pen, with my egg basket on one arm and the puppy's leash on the other, when I focused and saw one of the hens hanging upside-down! And I had almost walked right in there with the puppy
So I yelled for my husband to hold the dog outside, and went in to...
Our wonderful Gus is dead - we found him this morning in the backyard. He's buried overlooking the woods, where he chased all the varmints.
The chickens don't know it, but it'll be a long time before they can go outside the pen again. This place isn't the same without him.
We're waiting for a winter storm to hit - it's supposed to be 2 - 4 inches, followed by "wintry precipitation". This will likely leave us iced in, on top of a glassy clay hill. This is a big deal for Alabama!
It may not be safe to walk down to the coop for a day or two...My husband didn't want...
Buff Orpingtons rule. Here we are in the shortest days of the year, overcast, covered with ice and snow. They have no lights, no heat, and it's been too icy the last few days for me to get the new bag of layer pellets down the hill, so they're living on scratch grain, BOSS, and alfalfa...
When I let everybody out of the coop this morning, one of the hens stayed on the roost while everybody ran to eat. She didn't come down after a while, so I carried her over to the food - she ate but was limping heavily.
So she gets to vacation today in the isolation cage, so she can get enough...