DH is too intense with his chooks

columbiacritter

Songster
11 Years
Jun 7, 2008
1,602
29
194
Scappoose Oregon
He wants to breed and show desperately. He has several bantam flocks started, but his problem is every chook is a treasured jewel not a chicken. With the volume of birds he intends to have losing some to age, illnees, predators, or any of the other numerous reasons chickens die is going to be a common occurrence. Right now he takes every loss really hard and sulks for days. I euthanize his birds when it's nessecary, he gets too upset. I will euthanize a sick bird when I get home without waiting for him because he has such trouble making the final call.

Eventually he's going to have to cull to make room. He's not going to be able to keep every bird he hatches. I have told him several times I will NOT allow him to keep more birds than we can keep in healthy happy conditions. I will cull, I will make them go away if he leaves me no choice. It's causing stress neither of us needs.

A friend of mine with a similar issue with her hubbies pigeon hobby solved it with raccoon gettting it the coop periodically and making off with birds. When she felt it was getting out of hand the raccoon would come back and make room then she'd drop off some cages at the auction barn on her way to work. The only problem she ever had was when her DH bought the same bird back twice at the auction without even realizing his "replacement" was his bird to begin with. I wish mine was that easily fooled.
 
Men are bigger softies then we are, us women are bred to have a iron heart to compensate for our compassion, and men just aren't. It doesn't matter what flies out of their mouth.

My DH hates cats, and last summer I had to put down my moms cat she got from her father, while she was on vacation. I took him along to drive me & call my mom. I cried when I said good bye, but when he went to call my mom, he broke down sobbing. LOL my mom kept asking if he was ok and I had to finish the convo and let her know what happened. We both chuckled a little as we were comforting HIM.

End result, be the iron hearted woman you are, and lay it down. Start taking records, who's producing? Who's up to standards? How much are you making/loosing? What sicknesses are going through?
 
Wow, that's harsh. Why squelch someone else's happiness? Especially the happiness of someone you love?
 
No, its not. If he can't keep chickens in happy, healthy conditions, then he needs to cut down size.

I didn't want to bring up THE "H" word, because that's not my place to judge, but have you ever watched an animal hoarding show? They'd often be fine with half their number, but they go too many animals and quality of life deteriorates.

(OP, am not calling your husband a hoarder!!)
 

New posts New threads Active threads

Back
Top Bottom