Poultry 4H meeting ideas / leader & parent discussion thread

[averytds]

They may ignore it, but I wear the still save the info and file it away somewhere. I've heard stuff pop up out of the blue, even years later.


Okay, I checked and we've got a demonstration in Mar. We have or can have at our disposal, Silkies, chicks and assorted egg colors....anything else that might appeal?

Thoughts on what to demo????

 

[dmiravalle]

That is awsome! Babies always help! I would do something on basic care and how "easy" it is to keep chickens. Lure them in! And talk about the differences between store bought eggs and eggs you raise yourself. JMO

 

[Cloverleaf Farm]

Hey all, just wanted to tell you all about a small animal workshop our county 4H put on today. The morning was rabbits and cavies, afternoon was poultry and pigeons. Cost was $5/child or $10/family, each child could bring one animal in each category. There was a raffle with donated items and concessions. All proceeds went to the small animal advisory to help pay for judges, etc for fair.
For each section (rabbits, poultry, etc) there was a specific speaker. For chickens, it was someone who was involved with our county 4H growing up, and is now the local poultry club President and in the APA judge's apprentice program. He talked about showmanship first, and then had the kids bring their birds up to the table (by class) and he judged their conformation and explained to each of the kids what he was looking for with their particular breed, asked them if they knew of any faults with their birds, and then explained any that he found, and told them if he thought their bird was a good bird to show, or if he suggested finding another bird. We ALL learned alot (he let parents/4H leaders stand behind the kids to hear all that was said) and had a great time!!
We took one of our project Faverolles (because I knew that he used to raise them!) and got some REALLY helpful information on where our project is going.

It was SO GREAT!!!

 

[danielle82]

Ive got a 4-H meeting tonight, its a main club meeting for all the projects, but we're doing a "chicken" thing tonight. I'm gonna do basic chicken coops and runs (talk about predators and how to prevent that) and a little on biosecurity (i like the finger paint idea lol) then I'll have all of them sketch out some coop ideas

 

[CowgirlJules]

I'm not a leader, but I put together one meeting on incubation and hatching for ours. I'm planning another one to teach them how to process meat birds in a couple of weeks. We'll actually process birds with home tools. They can either use my birds, which are ready, or some of them have extras from their meat pens for Fair. One of the fairs will already be done by that point. Has anyone else done one like this? How did it go for you? I think snacks may be out, as we'll be pretty grubby.

I've really enjoyed doing these two meetings, but the thought of actually doing all the rest of the leader stuff gives me the willies. How do you all do it on top of jobs and all of the rest of the stuff?

 

[Cloverleaf Farm]

Quote:
Yeah, on the coop ideas...be prepared for sillyness! LOL My kids had water slides and hot tubs in their chicken coops.....

 

[Countrypunk92]

I did 4-H poultry. Now going to state FFA poultry tomorrow. Anyway, Bring a few breeds of chickens and show them off, I woiuld have them draw a coop design or go over how to raise them.

 

[danielle82]

it went well! they did very creative with their predator control (metal plating, heat seeking lasers etc lol) I had some of them be "predators" and some be humans wanting to visit and pet the chickens (using finger paint) . I had my four year old son do one too even though hes too young for 4-H, and everybody that came to his coop and asked to "come in" he would say "sure!" so he had all this finger paint footsteps around on his coop. At the end when we looked at everyones coops and how well they did I told him that all his chickens are sick now cause he let people in his coop and they had chicken diseaeses and he said "WHAT??? Oh No...that wasn't MY coop...thats the neighbors coop!" hahaha
It was fun for everyone though, even the seniors in highschool had fun with it!

 

[BantamSlave02]

I show rabbits and poultry. It's not extremely busy because they're in the same barn. I enjoy poultry more than rabbit, partly because a lot of the rabbit parents are the ones that want to win so bad that they force their children to do it.

 

[BantamSlave02]

Hey dmiravalle, do you have family in non coastal Northern California? I know someone local with that last name.