- Feb 8, 2010
- 102
- 2
- 109
This all started because Ellebelle had a chair reupholstered in Pennsylvania. She figured it would be a whole lot cheaper than having it done here in NYC. She was right, (as she always is,) and ended up paying half of the quote she got in NYC. We got the call a week ago that it was finished, and it could be picked up. I had this week off from work, so I volunteered to go get it. I could see my parents and my Grandma, get out of the city for a bit, and make a couple of stops along the way back. Ellebelle had to teach, so she couldn't go. So I called my old roommate, borrowed up his car, and away I went.
On the way there, I did the straight-shot drive, which takes me about 6 hours. On the way back I decided to drive the slow route and make a couple of stops. One for a couple of bags of food, and one to pick up a white silkie bantie to surprise the girlfriend. Taking a detour of a couple of hours would be easier than killing a whole other day going to get the food, and it would be cheaper than what I'd pay in shipping.
We want to keep our chickens ~mostly~ organic. All the feed we buy will be organic. Sure, I know it's gonna cost more per bag, but it's totally worth knowing what's going into our chickens, which ultimately means ourselves since we'll be eating the eggs. I say ~mostly~ because the birds are going to free range in our yard, and get kitchen scraps. Most of the food we buy for us is organic, but the Mexican place down the street probably can't say the same! Since the birds will be getting all the leftovers, we won't advertise the eggs as "100% organic." But ~mostly~ organic is just fine for us and our friends. Any eggs we get from our birds will be healthier and fresher than what eggs we can buy. So we're keeping them as organic as possible.
We bought a bag of organic chick starter from MPC to start our birds on. I didn't mind spending $26 on 10# of food. Sure, it's quite a bit more expensive than getting a full bag. But since we only have three birds, I didn't expect to go through a whole 50 pounds of starter. The tag on the bag from MPC told us it came from McGreary.
Which leads me to my first stop, McGeary Grains in Lancaster, PA. I gave them a call to check on the price of developer and layer pellets, and asked where I could get their products. They said "Come on by, we will gladly sell you a bag or two!" I was impressed. I didn't need to open an account, I didn't need to have a business license, I just needed to show up. So I did!
I punched their address into Google, hit print, said goodbye to the parents, and away I went. Since I usually take I-80, the drive on the local highways was a welcome change. The drive across PA was gorgeous. I'm jamming out to the radio, drinking my coffee, just enjoying the day.
I'm following the Google map directions, and it says I have two turns and quarter of a mile to go. I was in the middle of town. I start wondering if I punched in the address correctly. I check the sheet. Sure enough, the address is correct. I make the last turn and see a school on one side of the street, an office building on the other. It sure doesn't look like a grain mill to me. I pull around the block, find a parking space, and give them a call. Sure enough, I've got the right place. They tell me to meet them at the big garage door and they'll have the grain.
I pull up to the door, and a guy in a button down shirt and khakis wheels out two bags of grain on a cart. He's not a dock worker, or some minimum wage kid from the mill, but one of the guys from the office. He introduces himself as Dave. At this point I'm pretty impressed someone from management would take the time to bring the grain out himself. So I load the grain in the trunk, and go upstairs to pay.
While we're riding up the elevator Dave asks me if I am married. I tell him no, but I live with my girlfriend. He asks if she bakes. I say nope, I'm the baker in the house. He looks mildly surprised, and says, We have a flour mill as well. Let me give you a free sample of our organic pastry flour. Sweet! (pun intended here, folks) Free stuff! While I give the accountant my payment info, he goes and gets not one, but two kinds of flour for me. He shakes my hand, says thanks for the business, and goes back to work. I get my receipt and head out to my next destination, thinking how great these guys are.
Ellebelle has wanted a white silkie since she first saw a picture of one. Which happened to be the day AFTER I placed my order for three birds from My Pet Chicken. A quick email to MPC and I found out I could change the order, but it would be a $10 change fee and would delay our order two weeks. We ordered our birds early enough they could be out of the spare bathroom before we have house guests next month, so the two week wait would throw everything off. Reluctantly we passed on the silkie. I've been scouring the board looking for one silkie hen, but nobody had one for sale. And since we only want one pullet, nobody would ship. We thought we were out of luck.
But once I realized I would be driving through PA, I started making phone calls and emails. Finally I found JM Hatchery in New Holland, PA. I shot them an email and asked if I could stop by and pick up one FEMALE silkie. I'd have a box with a heat pack, and it would be a short drive home. They said, Sure, come on by!
So I show up and meet Martin. He takes me into the hatchery, where he happens to be vaccinating banties. He stops, looks at me, (and suddenly remembers,) Oh, you wanted a female, didn't you?
Yeah. I can't have roos in NYC.
Uh-oh. I forgot. And the guy who vent sexes these birds left for the day. So you should take two or three and you'll probably get a hen out of the group. The other ones you can sell. I ship over 100 bantams to New York every week. The Chinese make soup out of them. You should be able to sell the leftovers pretty quick.
Now here's my problem. I know Ellebelle. If I show up and surprise her with three birds, (yes, she doesn't know at this point she's getting her banties,) she will indeed want to keep all three birds. But statistically I know the more birds I get, the better the chances we get one hen are. So I think for a minute and decide on two birds. Two banties won't take up much more space than one, if we happen to get lucky and have both girls. And if I have to get rid of one, it will be easy to do. IF we happen to get two roos, I'm in trouble!
So I pick out two and put them in the box. Martin says I only have to pay for one, since they forgot to sex them for me. Sweet. More free stuff! I load them in the car and away we go.
Did I mention how nice of a day it was? Sun was shining, perfect 65 degrees, and as soon as I got back in the car, I realized I had to keep the windows up to keep the drafts off the birds. Which also meant the car would act like a greenhouse in the mid day sun. Great. I get to cook myself the last 3 hours of my drive. Good thing I have a bottle of water.
The rest of the drive is uneventful. Some traffic, but nothing unexpected. The two peeps were pretty mellow. I think they were mostly sleeping. However, I did notice they have good taste in music. They'd be doing their normal ever-so-often peep, then the music would change on the radio. Depending on what came on, they would either just do the normal quiet cheep-cheep, or go crazy.
When Landslide by Fleetwood Mac came on, they were quiet. When Sharp Dressed Man by ZZ Top came over the airways, the chicks went nutso. Cheeping right along with all the great guitar parts, those little fluffs were rocking out. I really wish I had video.
I get back into NYC and send Ellebelle a text message, asking if she's home. I'm hoping she can come help unload the car, or at least watch it while I carry the chair inside. If you have someone waiting in the car, they won't give you a parking ticket for double parking. And since parking tickets are now $115 I'd rather not get one.
Her reply says she's still at work. I ask her if she wants a ride home, which she does. I change direction and go to pick her up. I guess her boss asked her why she was packing up so fast, and she said to him I've got a ride home. To which he says Pack faster, don't make him wait!
While I'm waiting for her to come out of the building, the chicks are peeping. LOUD. Then I realize they're jamming to Green Day's American Idiot I turn off the radio, close the box the birds are in, and hide it in the back seat. I hope they'll keep quiet enough and not spoil the surprise.
Ellebelle gets in the car and oohs and ahhs at the chair. She picked out a great fabric for it. She has great taste. (She is dating me, after all!) I hand her the bottle of home-made root beer I bought for her. (She had just picked her first sassafras the week before and we talked about making root beer.) As I pulled away from the curb, I pulled out the box that had the chicks in it.
IS THIS A CHICKEN?!? She screamed while carefully ripping into the box. YAY! You bought me my bantie! THERE'S TWO! YAY- Wait. Why are there two? So I tell her the whole sexing story. I hope there's two girls, she says. I agree and we go home.
Our three full-sized birds were born three weeks ago, so they didn't mind the new additions. One of the big birds walked over to the silkie, looked at it quizzically, cheeped, then grabbed the banties foot-fuzz. This tipped over the little bird and started it peeping as well. Once all the birds mingled for a minute, and we realized there wouldn't be trouble, we left them alone. Until Ellebelle went and got her camera.
So here's 'Kung-Pao'
and here's 'Soup' (maybe to be renamed later)
Hopefully they'll be girls and we get to keep them both. Now I'm off to re-design my coop to hold all 5 birds.
Cheers,
B
On the way there, I did the straight-shot drive, which takes me about 6 hours. On the way back I decided to drive the slow route and make a couple of stops. One for a couple of bags of food, and one to pick up a white silkie bantie to surprise the girlfriend. Taking a detour of a couple of hours would be easier than killing a whole other day going to get the food, and it would be cheaper than what I'd pay in shipping.
We want to keep our chickens ~mostly~ organic. All the feed we buy will be organic. Sure, I know it's gonna cost more per bag, but it's totally worth knowing what's going into our chickens, which ultimately means ourselves since we'll be eating the eggs. I say ~mostly~ because the birds are going to free range in our yard, and get kitchen scraps. Most of the food we buy for us is organic, but the Mexican place down the street probably can't say the same! Since the birds will be getting all the leftovers, we won't advertise the eggs as "100% organic." But ~mostly~ organic is just fine for us and our friends. Any eggs we get from our birds will be healthier and fresher than what eggs we can buy. So we're keeping them as organic as possible.
We bought a bag of organic chick starter from MPC to start our birds on. I didn't mind spending $26 on 10# of food. Sure, it's quite a bit more expensive than getting a full bag. But since we only have three birds, I didn't expect to go through a whole 50 pounds of starter. The tag on the bag from MPC told us it came from McGreary.
Which leads me to my first stop, McGeary Grains in Lancaster, PA. I gave them a call to check on the price of developer and layer pellets, and asked where I could get their products. They said "Come on by, we will gladly sell you a bag or two!" I was impressed. I didn't need to open an account, I didn't need to have a business license, I just needed to show up. So I did!
I punched their address into Google, hit print, said goodbye to the parents, and away I went. Since I usually take I-80, the drive on the local highways was a welcome change. The drive across PA was gorgeous. I'm jamming out to the radio, drinking my coffee, just enjoying the day.
I'm following the Google map directions, and it says I have two turns and quarter of a mile to go. I was in the middle of town. I start wondering if I punched in the address correctly. I check the sheet. Sure enough, the address is correct. I make the last turn and see a school on one side of the street, an office building on the other. It sure doesn't look like a grain mill to me. I pull around the block, find a parking space, and give them a call. Sure enough, I've got the right place. They tell me to meet them at the big garage door and they'll have the grain.
I pull up to the door, and a guy in a button down shirt and khakis wheels out two bags of grain on a cart. He's not a dock worker, or some minimum wage kid from the mill, but one of the guys from the office. He introduces himself as Dave. At this point I'm pretty impressed someone from management would take the time to bring the grain out himself. So I load the grain in the trunk, and go upstairs to pay.
While we're riding up the elevator Dave asks me if I am married. I tell him no, but I live with my girlfriend. He asks if she bakes. I say nope, I'm the baker in the house. He looks mildly surprised, and says, We have a flour mill as well. Let me give you a free sample of our organic pastry flour. Sweet! (pun intended here, folks) Free stuff! While I give the accountant my payment info, he goes and gets not one, but two kinds of flour for me. He shakes my hand, says thanks for the business, and goes back to work. I get my receipt and head out to my next destination, thinking how great these guys are.
Ellebelle has wanted a white silkie since she first saw a picture of one. Which happened to be the day AFTER I placed my order for three birds from My Pet Chicken. A quick email to MPC and I found out I could change the order, but it would be a $10 change fee and would delay our order two weeks. We ordered our birds early enough they could be out of the spare bathroom before we have house guests next month, so the two week wait would throw everything off. Reluctantly we passed on the silkie. I've been scouring the board looking for one silkie hen, but nobody had one for sale. And since we only want one pullet, nobody would ship. We thought we were out of luck.
But once I realized I would be driving through PA, I started making phone calls and emails. Finally I found JM Hatchery in New Holland, PA. I shot them an email and asked if I could stop by and pick up one FEMALE silkie. I'd have a box with a heat pack, and it would be a short drive home. They said, Sure, come on by!
So I show up and meet Martin. He takes me into the hatchery, where he happens to be vaccinating banties. He stops, looks at me, (and suddenly remembers,) Oh, you wanted a female, didn't you?
Yeah. I can't have roos in NYC.
Uh-oh. I forgot. And the guy who vent sexes these birds left for the day. So you should take two or three and you'll probably get a hen out of the group. The other ones you can sell. I ship over 100 bantams to New York every week. The Chinese make soup out of them. You should be able to sell the leftovers pretty quick.
Now here's my problem. I know Ellebelle. If I show up and surprise her with three birds, (yes, she doesn't know at this point she's getting her banties,) she will indeed want to keep all three birds. But statistically I know the more birds I get, the better the chances we get one hen are. So I think for a minute and decide on two birds. Two banties won't take up much more space than one, if we happen to get lucky and have both girls. And if I have to get rid of one, it will be easy to do. IF we happen to get two roos, I'm in trouble!
So I pick out two and put them in the box. Martin says I only have to pay for one, since they forgot to sex them for me. Sweet. More free stuff! I load them in the car and away we go.
Did I mention how nice of a day it was? Sun was shining, perfect 65 degrees, and as soon as I got back in the car, I realized I had to keep the windows up to keep the drafts off the birds. Which also meant the car would act like a greenhouse in the mid day sun. Great. I get to cook myself the last 3 hours of my drive. Good thing I have a bottle of water.
The rest of the drive is uneventful. Some traffic, but nothing unexpected. The two peeps were pretty mellow. I think they were mostly sleeping. However, I did notice they have good taste in music. They'd be doing their normal ever-so-often peep, then the music would change on the radio. Depending on what came on, they would either just do the normal quiet cheep-cheep, or go crazy.
When Landslide by Fleetwood Mac came on, they were quiet. When Sharp Dressed Man by ZZ Top came over the airways, the chicks went nutso. Cheeping right along with all the great guitar parts, those little fluffs were rocking out. I really wish I had video.
I get back into NYC and send Ellebelle a text message, asking if she's home. I'm hoping she can come help unload the car, or at least watch it while I carry the chair inside. If you have someone waiting in the car, they won't give you a parking ticket for double parking. And since parking tickets are now $115 I'd rather not get one.
Her reply says she's still at work. I ask her if she wants a ride home, which she does. I change direction and go to pick her up. I guess her boss asked her why she was packing up so fast, and she said to him I've got a ride home. To which he says Pack faster, don't make him wait!
While I'm waiting for her to come out of the building, the chicks are peeping. LOUD. Then I realize they're jamming to Green Day's American Idiot I turn off the radio, close the box the birds are in, and hide it in the back seat. I hope they'll keep quiet enough and not spoil the surprise.
Ellebelle gets in the car and oohs and ahhs at the chair. She picked out a great fabric for it. She has great taste. (She is dating me, after all!) I hand her the bottle of home-made root beer I bought for her. (She had just picked her first sassafras the week before and we talked about making root beer.) As I pulled away from the curb, I pulled out the box that had the chicks in it.
IS THIS A CHICKEN?!? She screamed while carefully ripping into the box. YAY! You bought me my bantie! THERE'S TWO! YAY- Wait. Why are there two? So I tell her the whole sexing story. I hope there's two girls, she says. I agree and we go home.
Our three full-sized birds were born three weeks ago, so they didn't mind the new additions. One of the big birds walked over to the silkie, looked at it quizzically, cheeped, then grabbed the banties foot-fuzz. This tipped over the little bird and started it peeping as well. Once all the birds mingled for a minute, and we realized there wouldn't be trouble, we left them alone. Until Ellebelle went and got her camera.
So here's 'Kung-Pao'
and here's 'Soup' (maybe to be renamed later)
Hopefully they'll be girls and we get to keep them both. Now I'm off to re-design my coop to hold all 5 birds.
Cheers,
B
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