St. Louis Science Center Chicken Display

[Kiki]

Get in your car / plane and come out!

Next time.
That is a long road trip.


You will have to have birds ready for me bring home when I come.

 

[centrarchid]

My eye candy Tookey bit the dust. My wife thinks he consumed some of her weed killer pellets. I did not know she put the stuff down in the daylily patch.
Recent images of Tookey.

He was a striking bird.


His father Edgar was pulled out of retirement to serve as the bait, but he is not nearly as striking to the eye from a distance. Below is how Edgar looked as a bullstag three years ago.

As full blown cock he is still fairly pretty, but has a majorly messed up beak.

I forgot I had this image with Tookey (lower right next to his dad Edgar) as juvenile around 7 weeks old.

Ideally the birds would be in mint condition for the public's viewing pleasure although the option now exists to discuss the importance of the extreme utility beak, a key feature I think helped the avian dinosaur survive what their beak-less kin could not. It is will be easy to demonstrate how the damage to his beak impacts much of what he does.


My son was upset about the loss of his pet Tookey. To get him on another track we immediately went up and named Tookey's three oldest offspring; Turk (female), Took (male that looks most like his father), and Turk (male that appears homozygous for the toppy allele). We have 36 hours to train them to respond only to their respective names and to fly up on command. Will be cutting that objective close to the buzzer.

 

[Kiki]

I'm sorry to hear about Tookey.
Good luck with the job ahead.

 

[centrarchid]

We will survive. Whole family insisting more backups named Tookey. At least no drama.

 

[centrarchid]

Today is hardest part of effort. We are going to be collecting aquatic critters from ponds as we harvest Largemouth Bass fingerlings. Many of the critters collected are bycatch we must invest a great deal of time to separate from stock. During this time Edgar will be out with us so the two new students can be familiarized with chickens that fly up on you when called. The students must relaxed, otherwise the audience will be nervous. Edgar will be following us around at many locations including ponds, lab, tractor supply and truck. Students will be getting information overload as they exposed to a large number of aquatic critters most people are flat out scared of and can produced painful bites when mishandled. Will attempt to load up some pictures of that part of mess. Students are undergraduate college students.

 

[Kiki]

 

[centrarchid]

Did not have time to take pictures. Too much going on in terms of putting out fires. Truck is setup for rapid loading and departure. I did a dry run with hen and chicks in cage. He stress was an issue as temperature about 96 F. Tomorrow expected to be higher between 98 and 100 F so will be having birds on wetted towel for the return trip back. Trip there will not be a problem because temperature will be down in the 80's as highest.

 

[centrarchid]

In route

 

[centrarchid]

 

[Kiki]

Good luck!