- Mar 2, 2013
- 52
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Hello all, I'm a long-time crazy chicken lady, currently living in northern Nevada. I've had chickens most of my life and have done everything from raising, slaughtering and processing chickens for table, to keeping chickens for eggs and as awesome pets. I've had chicks hatch under broodies and in our incubators.
Gonna answer the standard newbie questions now...
(1) Are you new to chickens / when did you first get chickens?
Growing up, our family had a small ranchette in southern California, where we kept a mixed flock for meat/eggs/pets along with horses, ducks, turkeys, rabbits, a small fruit tree orchard and a huge vegetable garden. We did all our own care for everything ourselves, so I learned sustainability early on! My current flock started in 1995 with 3 hens.
(2) How many chickens do you have right now?
Do I really have to admit this...? OK, current flock is 36 birds of various breeds. But that number HAS been a bit higher...
(3) What breeds do you have?
Oh lordy...OK, here goes: Giant Cochins, Pekin Cochins, light & buff Brahmas, EE, Americaunas, Polish, Belgian d'Uccles, Brinkotter, white Leghorn, Sex Links, Barred Rock, Frizzles, buff Orp, Krainkoppe, New Hampshire & Salmon Faverolle.
(4) How did you find out about BackYardChickens.com?
EVERYONE knows about BYC!
(5) What are some of your other hobbies?
Gardening, whipping our new house into order with painting/unpacking boxes, writing, playing mountain dulcimer, canning, various crafts such as origami and mosaic tile work.
(6) Tell us about your family, your other pets, your occupation, or anything else you'd like to share.
I worked in the field of dentistry for many years, and all of that medical training sure comes in handy for chicken emergencies! Married with one teenage girl, we live on a half acre in your basic house. We just moved (moving 36 nervous chickens over 400 miles was NOT fun, BTW) to the Eastern Sierras of northern Nevada in 2012 from southern California, the house and property had been neglected for years so we're still getting them into order. Outside of the chickens we have a family dog and 4 cage birds. Eventually we plan on creating a raised bed vegetable garden and planting more fruit trees.
I love to talk chickens and help newcomers to chicken keeping whenever I can, so I created a chicken information page here:
http://jackshenhouse.com/
We do a web-broadcast called 'Chickam' live (since 2008), with sound, a baby chick hatch every year that has been very popular. After the hatch, the cam is moved to the brooder box for the next 8 weeks and runs 24/7 so people can watch them grow. It's been tremendous fun for us and last year I gave a live talk to the kindergarten classes at a school in Georgia that they seemed to enjoy very much. Our next Chickam event for 2013 is planned for April 20th, the link to the UStream page is here, there is also more info on my chicken page linked above:
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/chickam2008
I also keep a LiveJournal for everyday family stuff if anyone wants to read it:
http://velvet-sparrow.livejournal.com/
Twitter pages for me (Velvet Sparrow) and Chickam here:
https://twitter.com/
https://twitter.com/
Whew! That's a lot, hope I haven't left anything out.
Gonna answer the standard newbie questions now...
(1) Are you new to chickens / when did you first get chickens?
Growing up, our family had a small ranchette in southern California, where we kept a mixed flock for meat/eggs/pets along with horses, ducks, turkeys, rabbits, a small fruit tree orchard and a huge vegetable garden. We did all our own care for everything ourselves, so I learned sustainability early on! My current flock started in 1995 with 3 hens.
(2) How many chickens do you have right now?
Do I really have to admit this...? OK, current flock is 36 birds of various breeds. But that number HAS been a bit higher...
(3) What breeds do you have?
Oh lordy...OK, here goes: Giant Cochins, Pekin Cochins, light & buff Brahmas, EE, Americaunas, Polish, Belgian d'Uccles, Brinkotter, white Leghorn, Sex Links, Barred Rock, Frizzles, buff Orp, Krainkoppe, New Hampshire & Salmon Faverolle.
(4) How did you find out about BackYardChickens.com?
EVERYONE knows about BYC!
(5) What are some of your other hobbies?
Gardening, whipping our new house into order with painting/unpacking boxes, writing, playing mountain dulcimer, canning, various crafts such as origami and mosaic tile work.
(6) Tell us about your family, your other pets, your occupation, or anything else you'd like to share.
I worked in the field of dentistry for many years, and all of that medical training sure comes in handy for chicken emergencies! Married with one teenage girl, we live on a half acre in your basic house. We just moved (moving 36 nervous chickens over 400 miles was NOT fun, BTW) to the Eastern Sierras of northern Nevada in 2012 from southern California, the house and property had been neglected for years so we're still getting them into order. Outside of the chickens we have a family dog and 4 cage birds. Eventually we plan on creating a raised bed vegetable garden and planting more fruit trees.
I love to talk chickens and help newcomers to chicken keeping whenever I can, so I created a chicken information page here:
http://jackshenhouse.com/
We do a web-broadcast called 'Chickam' live (since 2008), with sound, a baby chick hatch every year that has been very popular. After the hatch, the cam is moved to the brooder box for the next 8 weeks and runs 24/7 so people can watch them grow. It's been tremendous fun for us and last year I gave a live talk to the kindergarten classes at a school in Georgia that they seemed to enjoy very much. Our next Chickam event for 2013 is planned for April 20th, the link to the UStream page is here, there is also more info on my chicken page linked above:
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/chickam2008
I also keep a LiveJournal for everyday family stuff if anyone wants to read it:
http://velvet-sparrow.livejournal.com/
Twitter pages for me (Velvet Sparrow) and Chickam here:
https://twitter.com/
https://twitter.com/
Whew! That's a lot, hope I haven't left anything out.
