Shadrach's Ex Battery and Rescued chickens thread.

[micstrachan]

Just plain miserable. It poured down all morning and early afternoon. 3C with wind chill and it blew the entire time I was at the allotments. Everybody came out for a while. Some went back to shelter pretty quickly even though the rain stopped. The wind was what made it uncomfortable for me and the chickens.View attachment 3329608View attachment 3329610View attachment 3329611

Looks like they atill chose to be out for a bit, which is nice.

 

[micstrachan]

Given the picture came from an article about the terrible poverty many Afghans are now living in primarily due to the sanctions the West has imposed on the country having tried to beat it and bomb it into submission I would assume the women iis going to hang the chicken by its feet and cut it's throat and eat it.

Probably. Still a nice picture. If it were me in the photo, I’d be cherishing my pet. (cue the eye roll) She may be cherishing a meal. Or an egg maker.

 

[micstrachan]

It's been chucking it down on and off most of the day. Despite the downpours the chickens were determined to get out of the run the moment the rain abated.
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Sitting on the roost bar with the chickens waiting for the hail to stop.
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The state of the run.
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Oh, boy. Here comes the mud again. Too bad nobody wants to give you free wood chips.

 

[micstrachan]

I'm missing Ribh who hasn't posted on her thread for a while.
I'm going to be around less for the next couple of weeks.
Most of my family have caught yet another bout of Covid and I need to help them out as best I can. So far 6 are down with the bug.

That’s a bummer, Shad! My family has a nasty virus rhat is NOT Covid… maybe RSV. I was just on doxycycline for a full seven days and my sinuses did not improve one bit. For me, viruses tgat hit my sinuses turn into bacterial infections… Something about my anatomy. Not sure if I need another round or to wait it out. Hubby ia coughing so hard it makes him puke. Just call us the fun bunch.

 

[micstrachan]

I'm missing Ribh who hasn't posted on her thread for a while.
I'm going to be around less for the next couple of weeks.
Most of my family have caught yet another bout of Covid and I need to help them out as best I can. So far 6 are down with the bug.

I’ve been wondering about Ribh, as well. My timeline BYC has been intermittent, but I still noticed she seem med to be missing.

 

[micstrachan]

Tax for political talk: a young couple stepping out together
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Gorgeous couple!

 

[Perris]

Gorgeous couple!

I thought so too. That's Uppsala, the prettiest and wariest of Venka's lookalike daughters, and Fforest, the young gent whose parentage is uncertain.

 

[Solanacae]

I can't answer for the yanks, but the UK started adopting decimal measures for most things in 1971.

However, while the change was made dramatic for currency, it wasn't for measures (ever the pragmatists) and e.g. miles and pints have stayed in common usage, and feet and inches too for quite a lot of us, even people born after 1971 (because our kids are surrounded by people who don't think or speak in metric measures). You might find this website entertaining https://ukma.org.uk/ - still campaigning for the change, 51 years later

Ultimately imperial measures, so called, are based on body parts, and they are easier to visualize and use than abstract measures based on once-and-ideally-but-no-longer-accurate measurements of the circumference (horizontally) of the earth. (And they were invented by the French, which doesn't help with adoption here of course.)

I can’t find the article, but a while ago I read an interesting article on the reason a base 12 measuring system even existed in the first place. The author pointed out (like you mentioned here) how yards and feet and inches correspond to body parts but also talked about how having a system that was divisible by so many numbers (2, 3, 4, 6) made it an excellent system for masons, carpenters, bakers, etc. because you had so many ratios that were easy to estimate visually. I do quite a bit of baking and cooking, and it’s a lot easier to divide something into two or three equal parts than five. I appreciated learning the history of why such a system existed when our counting system is base 10.

That's crazy..... although I forgot that in the States there's abandoned mining towns. Not sure if they are available

Some of the mine tailings around those abandoned mining towns make for far less pretty scenery than that village in Spain, not to mention toxic. One of my uncles liked to explore the mountains near his house as a teenager. He found an abandoned mine one time and brought home some sticks of dynamite to show my grandma. He was horribly offended when she called the cops after showing her the dynamite - he’s lucky he didn’t get blown to bits hiking home - and the police showed up with a bomb squad. They took the dynamite and made my uncle show them where the mine was so they could blow up the entrance so no one else could get in.

Tax: a couple of chicks my sister got. They’ll live here with my flock, but she’ll help pay for food and get their eggs. These two were rescued from a chicken hoarding situation, and they got moved outside yesterday. They’re still quarantined from the main flock but finally have enough feathers I felt comfortable with them being outside. They’ve got an enclosed space with a heat cave since the temperature difference between inside and outside is pretty dramatic. My sister named them Estella and Genevieve.

 

[ManueB]

If anyone's interested, there's a feature piece in a newspaper today on the area where I live. I can confirm the writer's opinion of the pub food, as well as the walk
https://www.theguardian.com/travel/...pub-britannia-inn-gower-peninsula-south-wales

It makes it sound like a nice place to live. I didn't realize you were so close to the sea, I have very hazy geographical notions .

I am of the view that democracy as we know it just works less badly than all the other systems that have been tried, as Churchill once famously said.

That is also my mother's view that I have heard her repeating all my life !
In my left wing family it was the mantra of those preaching for moderation. It doesn't completely convince me.

My flock is acting a bit weird lately. If I let them out to free range. They go out for an hour or maybe 2. After that the chickens return to the run by themselves. No scratch needed to lure them and lock them up.
I give scratch anyway. And the know this of course.

But I am wondering. Why do they prefer going back into the run above free ranging whole day.
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The opening between party-run attached to the coop and the run in the back. Nice if I want to separate a new chicken or a broody.

Mine stay under cover, trees, brush or the coop when hawks are moving

My chickens also stay much more inside the coop and in the run than they normally do, and when they go out they spend a good part of the time hidden. We have had many hawks flying above recently and one almost landing a few days ago.

I have a question in that regard. My coop as I've mentioned before is a vaulted ceiling around 20m2 / 215 sq feet and all the birds can shelter confortably. For those of you who have small coop types, like Shadrach or Perris, do your chickens ever shelter or go willingly in the coop during the day ? Shadrach I understand they don't really have a choice, but when you get to the allotment, are they dispatched between the coop and the run, or do they all stay in the run ?

That’s a bummer, Shad! My family has a nasty virus rhat is NOT Covid… maybe RSV. I was just on doxycycline for a full seven days and my sinuses did not improve one bit. For me, viruses tgat hit my sinuses turn into bacterial infections… Something about my anatomy. Not sure if I need another round or to wait it out. Hubby ia coughing so hard it makes him puke. Just call us the fun bunch.

Sorry for your health, I hope both of you get better. Definitely not fun .
I must say this is another thing I'm relishing about isolation - apart from COVID that our 97 years old neighbour gifted us last Christmas, I've not been sick in three years and a half, not even a cold.

Tax : the youth lack caution and will explore in spite of the hawks.

 

[Perris]

also talked about how having a system that was divisible by so many numbers (2, 3, 4, 6) made it an excellent system for masons, carpenters, bakers, etc.

exactly. Base 12 and fractions are much easier for people who need to divide physical things than base 10 and decimal places. There are a number of good books about it. We still work with base 60 for time and degrees, and no-one seems to find that difficult, oddly enough.