The Plymouth Rock Breeders thread

[Beekissed]

Wow, Fred!!! One, I can't imagine how tough that must be, especially for a white bird....but the fact that you cuddle them afterwards just tickles me to death!!!

I love it!!!! I bet there's some husbands and wives out there just watching and shaking their heads, wondering how long it's been since they got cuddles after a good, gentle bathing.....

I got a chuckle over the long list of ways to do a show bath....I'm just betting everyone has their secret formula for it. Makes sense on the method and also the rinsing with the vinegar.

Then one has to KEEP them clean long enough to get to the show and be judged.....

That must be a nightmare in and of itself.

Thanks for the insight, Fred, and I'll keep that in mind if there is ever a show opportunity that comes in my direction. I'd love to have my stock judged after I do a lot of work on it....and I do mean a lot. Would be great to get an expert opinion on the fine points of their development. Wouldn't it be neat to have virtual shows via YT for beginners so they can show a film of their bird in positions that judges use to eyeball them and let judges post comments? For some of us, that's as close as we will ever get to a show in this life.

 

[kimberly35042]

Beekissed -- we showed palomino horses for years and struggled with the whiter than white manes and tales. Adding a non chemical bluing to the rinse water was simply THE BEST way to get a dingy white turn sparkling white.

http://mrsstewart.com/


Fred -- I'd be interested in the website on the lady prepping for a show and what to expect.

 

[Beekissed]

Beekissed -- we showed palomino horses for years and struggled with the whiter than white manes and tales. Adding a non chemical bluing to the rinse water was simply THE BEST way to get a dingy white turn sparkling white.

http://mrsstewart.com/


Fred -- I'd be interested in the website on the lady prepping for a show and what to expect.

Excellent suggestion and link!!! Thank you! And your geese are just beautiful, BTW!

 

[Fred's Hens]

Laura Haggerty, a farm wife in Kentucky. Great articles here:

http://www.pathfindersfarm.com/Articles.html


A little caution on the bluing and white feathers. You cannot imagine how many folks have "over done" the bluing things and couldn't take their White birds to the fair or show or Ag Explo or whatever. I'm laughing, but when it happens, you mostly just cry.

 

[kimberly35042]

Posted this over on another breed thread, but I thought I'd post it here too. I know the regulars and those who follow and read along with this thread know this, but it was worth posting again.

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Our birds, all of them top, standard bred, excellent exhibition examples of their breeds, Rocks and Reds, are all FARM BIRDS. Every last one of them.

Please make no mistake. Yes, once or twice a year, they're dipped and dried, put up in a conditioning pen and taken to a show, well, a few of them anyhow, as I am not gonna wash 3 dozen birds, LOL. They get judged and exhibited openly against the finest birds and toughest competition around. I do not wish to be just some imagined, internet virtual breeder, but a real breeder without "barn blindness". i want the birds judged for how well they meet the Standard. It is encouraging to spend time with good poultry folks and judges, some of the best folks you'll ever meet.

Then, those birds get taken home and they go right back to work. They roll in the dirt and scratch and forage and within an hour or two one would ask, "What show birds?". I don't really keep or breed "show birds". I breed birds to the Standard and take them to a show or two, but they are unequivocally just farm birds.

And when folks come by our place to maybe purchase some produce from our farm, they may know nothing about poultry, but these birds often stop them dead in their tracks. They turn and stare, and finally say, "I know nothing about chickens but those are most gorgeous birds I've ever seen".

That.

Wow -- very interesting. Fred do you quarantine after a show?

 

[kimberly35042]

Ummm--yea MORE is not always better and especially with the bluing. It don't wash out and a smurf blue mane and tail just ain't right. Guessing a blue rock (smurf blue) wouldn't be quite right either

 

[kimberly35042]

Quote:
Thanks Bee! If I ever show them, they will have a little bluing in the rinse water

 

[Fred's Hens]

Sort of. I know. I know. Ask a hundred people and get a thousand responses on the whole disease phobia deal. A testimonial:
Walt Leonard shows his birds 10-12 times a year and has for almost 45 years. Walt says he has never, not once, brought home a disease from a show.

I don't want to side track this breeders thread into that WHOLE DISEASE/ IMMUNITY/ BIO-SECURITY debate.
Goodness, gracious, the server storage space fee this website alone has to rent to hold all the posts on that subject would raise 4 orphans in Bangladesh to adulthood.

 

[Fred's Hens]

Ummm--yea MORE is not always better and especially with the bluing. It don't wash out and a smurf blue mane and tail just ain't right. Guessing a blue rock (smurf blue) wouldn't be quite right either

Smurf Blue!!! That's it exactly, Just laughing so hard I've got go blow my nose now.

There are Blue Rocks, but I'm pretty sure my trying to pass of Whites as Blues would be DQ'd for faking.

 

[kimberly35042]