Thank you, that's so nice of you to say!
What got me into chickens here in Missouri? In a word - TICKS!
I don't mind snakes very much, if I have to deal with them, I can and do. But ticks give me the creepy-crawly screaming meemies! I had always lived in CO, NM and AZ, and then ... I met a man on line. And he lived in MO! And MO has, you guessed it, those nasty creepy-crawlies that we DON'T have in the Southwest! So I said fine, I can live here, if I can have chickens! And the rest is history. That was 15 years ago and I'm still here, and happily married to him.

But I'm sorry to say that my sweet "GC," my 24-yo granddaughter that I call my GirlChild, is now allergic to red meat - any meat that comes from any mammal - due to a tick bite. It's called an alpha-GAL allergy. Nasty critters!