Michigan Thread - all are welcome!

[Folly's place]

Raz, BE STRONG!!!
Pictures of my Belgian d'Uccle and babies Two days old One week old, tonight. Mary

 

[bigmrg74]

Went to an estate/divorce auction on Saturday. had a ton of stuff for sale, guns, ammo, old farm tools, baby stuff, kids stuff, and a whole lot of whatnot as well. It was like a quarter mile from the farm and after reviewing what tractor equipment they had there, I thought it wouldn't hurt to take a look at what they had there. Mostly had eyes on a ground driven manure spreader as our current turd hearse is getting to be in pretty rough shape. Got there to look at it, and saw that the one up for sale was probably needed some fixing to get it working. Saw some other stuff there that would have been nice to have, but both my brother and me didn't really see them going as cheap as we would have liked to have seen. Did walk around and checked out the place. It used to be a draft horse farm there but it just looked like the upkeep on the place just got to be too much for somebody and it wasn't getting taken care of that well. Had to been about 200 bales of hay in different spots around that looked like they were 3 years old and maybe even older. some covered in chicken poop. No horses around, so I would have thought somebody would have thought to sell that off at a hay auction years ago.

They also had some chickens there, and a white guinea hen as well. I think they were going to go on the block as well, if they could get ahold of the darn guinea anyway. Overall though, I wasn't all that impressed with what they had there for their set up. Just one of the horse stalls loosely covered in chicken wire. I could easily get my big mit in between where they had overlapped a run of wire over the other one. Not that chicken wire would really stopped a hungry raccoon anyways. and from walking around the barn there, there looked to be at least 2 different victims of some critter coming in and getting them. Might have been a third one, kinda hard to tell.

And to top it all off, in the coop stall itself, there were mice scurrying about in it, getting into the chicken feed I think, and none of the locked up chickens seem to pay them any mind. Heck, I'm pretty sure if my girls spotted a mouse in their coop or pen, they would treat it to a merry game of football, with the mouse used as the ball.

They did have some old style wooden chicken crates available, I kinda thought about bidding on them, but they were going to be going later on in the sale and I did have to go to work that afternoon. I did however spot a couple of metal signs I liked, and a small bucket of more modern draft horseshoes. Amy's dad went to the auction as well, and I told him to keep an eye out for those for me. He managed to get them for even cheaper than what I thought they would go for. I'm probably going to have my brother take a couple of those shoes into the shop where he works at to sandblast the rust off of them, and then we'll paint them and hang them up on the walls here. The extras? Heck, might just have to take them to chickenstock next year, use em to play horseshoes in the pits that they have up there. ;-)

 

[Tysonsmom]

Anybody in Michigan have a problem with mosquitoes and their chickens?

 

[aart]

Anybody in Michigan have a problem with mosquitoes and their chickens?

Not this year, hasn't hardly been any at all.

 

[chickflick]

No problem here! Just saying that it's been a good summer without them.

 

[RaZ]

Call to arms, my friends.

I made an offer on a house up North and should be moving soon.
Trouble is chicken are not currently allowed. However, they are writing a new ordinance to allow chickens is some areas. They have asked me to comment to the Planning Commission. They meeting is TONIGHT.

They are also taking public comments. You don't have to live there to comment.
If you support backyard chickens would you take time to comment in an e-mail to : [email protected]

Thank you,
RaZ

 

[1muttsfan]

Raz. There were no houses anywhere that allowed chickens? You are a glutton for punishment.

 

[RaZ]

Raz. There were no houses anywhere that allowed chickens? You are a glutton for punishment.

Perhaps.
They have asked me to help draft a decent ordinance to allow chickens in residential zoned areas. Where this house sits is surrounded on 3 sides by state land. There were turkeys in the yard when I pulled up.
The planning commission meets tonight but I can't be there. I drafted a letter and e-mailed just a few minutes ago. They would like more public comments, hence the call for help from BYCers.

I'm going up on Friday for the home inspection. Last hurdle before signing the deal.

 

[chickflick]

Why do you do this to yourself?? So many houses to choose from... Oh, RaZ!
Where is this house? Caseville?

 

[chickflick]

Ok, RaZ. Just sent a letter off. Good Luck with the inspection. Make sure to check out everything. Ask a lot of questions. If you have septic, make sure to have that inspected. One inspector almost cost us a sale on our house in Davison. Had to hire another to get it all straightened out.