Notes from Chicken Rebuttal Society (Updated with new pics post #22)

[Ravishaw]

3/20/2011

1) Little Suzie noticed that the pullets have combs that are beginning to turn red instead of pink. While CRS does not yet recognize the pullets as full fledged chickens it does acknowledge that they have made great leaps towards membership. They have kept their feathers particularly clean this past week and have not taken the best dust bathing spots.
More remarkable is that they have turned up several refreshing new places to dig for bugs out by the irrigation culverts. This will surely ensure them future spots on the bug committee.
Unfortunately there is one unpleasant item of business for the pullets. It came to our attention on Wednesday afternoon the human woman threw a large assortment of weeds out of the grow boxes. Amongst these weeds were many goodies including baby carrots, lettuce leaves, potato bugs, and sweet onion spuds. The pullets did not as much as chirp to let the rest of us know who were out by the irrigation culverts. NOTE TO PULLETS: one more toenail out of line and it will be severe pecking!

2) Jimmy Carter graciously arrived and helped complete the future chicken residence. It’s a building with two spacious apartments, huge floor to ceiling windows, and plenty of room for new chicks and brooding mamas to hunker. It looks a bit on the unfinished side, what with 1 door for both apartments, and several misshaped walls. Silly humans. On that note, we commemorate our faithful Wynadotte, Danish! Danish has moved to the broody mama apartment. She’s doing well and is setting on no less than 6 chicks! Congratulations to Danish on her hard work and general grouchy disposition. NOTE TO THE AMERICAUNAS: Danish forgives all of you for climbing on top of her and laying more eggs than she could count. (A chicken only has so many toes you know)

3) Nesting poles… The humans graciously started building us new perches outside on the west side of the house. The only problem is they’re 12 feet off the ground. Surely they know our delicate carriages are not meant for perches 12 feet off the ground. Rhonda appointed a committee to study the posts and their conclusion is that the human must have erred and decided to convert the perches into something to provide shade later. Silly humans…

4) Next week we will be searching for volunteers to create a new verse to the egg song. For centuries no rooster or hen has thought of a second verse and Rhonda wants volunteers to think of a new one. Make your community proud, start thinking of a new verse to the egg song today!

Until next week’s meeting, we remain your kind and benevolent leadership of the Chicken Rebuttal Society
Sincerely,
Agnes
President Chicken Rebuttal Society

 

[Red&Yellow]

Oh this is good! Too hilarious!!!

 

[gryeyes]

I believe a satellite chapter is being developed in my flock.....

 

[True Grit]

The CRS is strict!

 

[pixiedouglas]

lol

 

[Ravishaw]

Well it’s been a wonderful, wonderful week out here on the edge of Phoenix. The grass is slightly greener this week, the trees have filled in a little bit more, and we the chickens continue our benevolent involvement in this great country. We help make the pigment that paints the great landscape of our wonderful world.

Often times I get to sit back on the high perch and ponder what we as chickens can do for the betterment of chicken and mankind. So as the appointed leader of the Chicken Rebuttal Society I had a few notes to share, and possibly some of this week’s events to be shared to our neighbors in other pens, coops and pastures, may they ever be filled with clean shavings.

The first topic for this week, are the new baby chicks. There are seven of them somewhere under Danish’s ample posterior. Suzie took a sneak peak and confided that she found 2 more Americaunas, 3 Wyandottes and 2 New Jersey reds. She was interrupted in her first attempt by Danish, who upon finding Suzie’s head under her plumage pecked her quite soundly. Little Suzie quickly recovered and went to take a dust bath to calm her nerves. I prescribed her an afternoon under the shade of the fruit trees. The chicks are all healthy, eating and drinking. I should point out that if Danish would stop kicking all the wood shavings into the food dish the chicks would be able to eat more than just wood shavings. Such sound advice for so reasonable a price.

In the apartment next door, the pullets also continue to grow. They are a bit rascally, knocking shavings in their food AND water. They knock their water around the brooder, AND knock it over. This makes the humans happy because it bows the all-wood flooring. Rhonda swears she heard the human talking about making buffalo chicken if the pullets didn’t stop it. Silly human, no chickens come from Buffalos. Danish surprised me with a moment of civility. You see, now that she’s a momma, she’s about as friendly as a pin cushion and as approachable as an angry skunk. She surprised me by handing me a note with a request written on it that the pullets keep it down at night or she’s going to knock the wall down between the two apartments and get to whoopin some tail.

The humans continue to build a wall to give us hens some shade on the west side of the house. Yesterday afternoon the trellis’s went up on the 4x6 posts. The humans argued about the placement of the posts, commenting on how blasted hard the concrete had dried and that the posts weren’t going anywhere. Still no perches for the hens yet, but sometime they’ll remember that we like to perch in the shade too. Maybe they will even supply us with a tire full of dirt to dip in. We do treat our humans well, and want them to reciprocate.

Finally, yesterday the humans left the garage open! It was so exciting! Rhonda, Suzie and I were quick to find the bag of rolled oats, and started munching them. We were joined by a few other barred rocks who thought the bag was theirs and stood on it thus preventing anyone from getting any rolled oats out of it. Then they tried to scratch their way through the bag. When Rhonda had had enough she booted the silly barred rocks off the top and we all got back to munching. I’m not sure why but the Americaunas were fascinated by the Styrofoam and ate quite a bit before the human booted us out of the garage.

I do want to impart some wisdom about sleeping in nesting boxes. Yes the human will take you out and put you on a perch and you may not be placed next to whom you want to be. Here’s what happened to Rhonda just last night.
It had been a hard day and Rhonda was just looking forward to sleeping soundly all through the night. Unfortunately, as she scolded the wild rabbits in our yard for messing with the humans garden (she knew that WE would get blamed) it was almost dark. The rabbits departed with their fluffy tails between their legs. Rhonda ran to the coop, but she was too late. Several of the hens, and we won’t mention any names, were preched atop the ladder and she was unable to take her usually spot. So she settled for climbing laterally and wouldn’t you know it the wood shavings in the nesting box sure looked awful comfortable. She hopped in to set down and relax. There were even a few eggs in the box, but she didn’t mind sharing the space, a tired hen is a tired hen after all.

She’d just curled up with her head under her wing when the human came out, grabbed her and jerked her out of the box. If that weren’t bad enough his hands were wet! They were frigid! And if that weren’t bad enough he set her down next to the anti-social Wynadottes. They promptly gave her a juicy raspberry and turned away from her pitiful condition.
So it is in all seriousness that I caution any chicken or pullet, even little chicks, to avoid those nesting boxes after dark. Rhonda probably spent an hour cursing the human and his cold hands.

I remain humbly yours, Agnes (aka the leghorn).
President, Chicken Rebuttal Society

2 of the anti-social Wynadottes

Americauna startled by the click click of the camera

Sweet little Suzie

Rhonda the Rhode Island Red

 

[Emmalion]

Aww one of my babies looks just like one of yours. I was wondering who the parents were lol

 

[theoldchick]

Awesome photos! Awesome story!

 

[gryeyes]

Every time one of these missives comes out, I rush to read it. I do believe the reason my yard pencil (used for new coop discussions and measurements) disappeared is because a new Chapter of the CRS is forming in my flock. Someone needs to take notes, and I think it's Greta the SexLink.

 

[GammaPoppyLilyFlutter]

I love the CRS. Such chickens