Fluffy Butt Acres: Stories of our flock

[Pastel the Rooster]

That situation would have put me in a furious mood and I would have caused a real problem with those people.

I wasn't able to. I wanted to. Everytime I saw someone withing 20 feet of me I cursed them out in my head. The room needed to be silent. I had already broken the rules by talking to the hens.

 

[BY Bob]

Check just before bed to make sure she has some solid food in it, and to then compare with how it is first thing in the morning. With the added benefit of maybe encouraging her to roost in a more accessible place by placing her on the main roost as it is getting too dark for her to attempt to fly up to the rafters. (If you toss a few sunflower seeds to the others, maybe Babs will roost where she should, as well!)

I should have been more specific. Thanks for explaining why I suggested it.

 

[BY Bob]

I have talked to my parents about it. As I am pretty sure I have said before, I AM going to start a chicken rescue as a side job when I am older. I don't care what it takes, this has made up my mind. Thank you everyone for the kind words I am going to planning how to break these chickens out of jail! ☺

You are a good soul. The world needs more people like you.

 

[BY Bob]

I talked to a bunch of people on the way home. Some people said they don't care because the chickens were biting their bracelets (at least they didn't get bitten on the finger like me by a hen!) And others said that they felt bad for the birds. I talked to my advisor, and she agreed with me. She said that it was pure animal abuse, simply because the hens only get a square foot for themselves, and they need to be vaccinated. Then no one cares about them or for them anymore. I was glad some people agreed with me. Someone I am close to was there, and she said it was COMPLETE animal abuse. She has over 200 chickens, so she was furious about it.

This is hopeful. At least some people realized how awful it was.

 

[rural mouse]

Final egg count: 9 in the nest. Got to them as Thing was getting ready to settle in again after having spent ALL day up by the house and the pea shrubs. She is NOT acting like she's thinking about going broody, so the eggs came in tonight. Had 3 eggs from Lark and Indigo, another larger white egg, an egg each from Pippa and Maizie and 3 brown from I'm not sure which ladies.

 

[BY Bob]

Final egg count: 9 in the nest. Got to them as Thing was getting ready to settle in again after having spent ALL day up by the house and the pea shrubs. She is NOT acting like she's thinking about going broody, so the eggs came in tonight. Had 3 eggs from Lark and Indigo, another larger white egg, an egg each from Pippa and Maizie and 3 brown from I'm not sure which ladies.

That's a nice haul.

 

[Pastel the Rooster]

I must be missing something as you both had the same idea. Why is grabbing her before bedtime helpful? I mean I did today because the chance presented itself, but all I could tell was she was drinking a lot and had quite a liquid crop. I could tell that by observing her with the wild water.
I am missing something.

Could she have sour crop? Dear gosh, I hope that is not the case! I don't know exactly what sour crop is, but I do know it is something with the crop. Who would've guessed?

 

[Ponypoor]

They can go broody. Maybe Chiquita can teach them that being broody is a good thing.

I love that they already have appointed a sentinel. You will be amazed by how smart they are. Keep on watching.

I was thinking that myself also - they were broody raised and I bet they have a good chance of going broody. They sure are cute!

 

[Grandma The Chicken]

I skipped a few pages because I needed to post this right away.

We were not abusing chickens! Or at least I wasn’t. It was Poultry Eval for my FFA chapter at my school. I knew that it was going to be bad. They are meat birds and laying hens straight from a bird factory, so they have never gotten the proper care. It is a competition, to see how well you can judge meat and laying birds, cooked chickens products, raw products, and whole chickens carcasses. As awful as it sounds, I hope that all those live chickens pass away soon, that way they stop suffering. I wanted so badly to make an offer to buy the four laying hens, but I knew that I couldn’t. It broke my heart. I almost broke the silence that was in the room by screaming at people for dropping the birds and throwing them the the cages. It was awful. I was the only one who felt bad for the hens. I was the only one who pet them and gave them quick chin rubs. I was the only one who didn’t throw them in the cages or drop them, nor yank them out of the cages without getting their wing or feet stuck. I promise, I was not abusing them. I just want them to be put out of their misery and suffering. I hate hen factories. I’m sorry. It just really upset me, needing to be quiet and not being able to help people grab the chickens. It hurt me just as bad as it hurt the chickens. My dad wouldn’t give a crap, because in his mind, they are livestock that should die when they slow down egg production. It was pure animal abuse.

Seeing people treat chickens like that leaves me speechless. Since March/April is the time to start buying baby chickens, people go on ahead and buy them. Three stores near me, Agway, Knisely's Pet and Farm Center, as well as Tractor Supply sell chickens around March/April. At these 3 locations, the baby chicks cost around $3 each. In my area, we're only allowed a maximum of 4 and no roosters. If you accidentally got a rooster (which we did), give it to someone who lives in a different area where roosters are allowed. I'm sure everyone here can own a rooster but since my area is technically a borough, it's a little small, so that may be the reason since most people in the area live in no more than 0.50 acres unless they own farmland or houses over $400,000. I own only 0.13 acres and that's 6,098 sq ft. Here's the sad truth, though. When the time to buying chickens draw to a close, the companies that sell the baby chicks do the most cursed thing anyone would ever do. My dad told me that after "baby chicken season", the companies with the remaining baby chicks grind them up. The reason why, I don't know. Into what, I don't know. Possibly food. Heck, they might be the next ingredient in a dog or cat's wet/dry food. I checked and it was confirmed that Tractor Supply does in fact grind them up. It's not just the chicks but the ducks and other poultry/birds that are being sold. Change.org decided to start a petition to stop this. I don't know about Agway and Knisely's but I'm willing to bet they do the same thing too. This is a literal tragedy. The whole problem is this is literal animal abuse. Call ASPCA. I'd like to leave a report. I'm also confused. What's making this issue even worse is that the companies don't want to sell the poultry for free. I understand it's all part of business but why? Would you rather get arrested for grinding up animals or sell them for free and not get in trouble for it? I don't know if this is some sketchy law or rule the companies have to follow but is it the same for everywhere else or is it just Pennsylvania that does this? I sure hope Pennsylvania isn't the only state doing this or else we'd be the "most hated" state. To be quite honest, I've never had a passion or obsession over this state, anyways but that's besides the point.
You all know Tony is fidgety so if he hears this, it'll traumatize him more. Sorry for the blurry photo.

Let's talk about something happy, now. Funny captions.
I don't know what Parmesan was thinking when she said she wanted to be a model.

Mom? Why is that chicken acting like she is about to get swatted? (photo 1)
No, honey. She's aware of her surroundings.

 

[GregnLety]

Aurora is a career lady and fortunately EEs are not well known broodies. Knowing "The Way of the Chicken" does not mean being a broody. One can know a thing without being it.

Our EEs are the worst for going broody and they do it in pairs, lol. Still yet to have a broody Silky but maybe one of the young Silky crosses will be a broody girl.