Yesterday I heard peeping as I slogged through the muddy gloop of the chicken yard with buckets of feed and water. A chick's hatched! Our first! A fuzzy yellow peeper with a black stripe running from its head down its back, boldly came out from under mama's white feathers. She's been so determined to set that she hasn't cleaned herself, and she's speckled with black mud. Greedily the hen pecked at the chick starter I put out for the first of her brood.
This morning I tried to catch a glimpse of the newest arrival to the coops, but she's got the chick tucked away under her feathers - wings spread, tail fanned, guarding the clutch of about 6 intact eggs.
Earlier we'd wondered about the manliness of the Rhode Island Red rooster, but he's vindicated. It's saved his life.
I've ordered 150 chicks, including 10 guinea hens, from Ridgway Hatcheries in LaRue, intended as layers for next winter and meat for the freezer. The guineas will keep down ticks, bugs and snakes.
The chickens come as an apt symbol for the creativity we're feeling at chez Rosi. Since my husband quit the day job to go full-time in the winery, we feel creative and energized.
Who knew there is a cost to working in a corporation? We have more meals at home, more home fun with the family, and more time talking over ideas for the business. I suspect we will be healthier too.
This week he's working with our friend Jay to build the bride's changing room, and to transfer the wine into oak barrels for aging. The winery has its first wedding in April, and the place will be spiffed up and bride ready.
Showing posts with label raising chickens. Show all posts
Showing posts with label raising chickens. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 08, 2011
Wednesday, September 02, 2009
Big Chicken Day
I thought this was a writing blog! Hah! I want to write about chickens.
MONDAY the guinea hens screeched at the boy-gang of marauding young roosters, who invaded the vegetable patch for my ripening tomatoes. The guineas have no sense of volume. Everything is at high volume - they sound like a high-pitched pitbull barking. Then the old rooster, a Rhode Island Red with a huge black-feathered tail, joins in crowing to protect his tiny harem of five overworked girls. Overworked, because one rooster is more comfortable servicing ten chickens, and mine have developed sore spots which means they need to wear chicken bras - a saddle made of canvas to protect their backs from his spurs. It's all at full volume and I'm wondering what the neighbors think.
The turkey is spectating from his strawbale hutch near the vegetable patch. He's a bronze-breasted, and his head turns red when he's upset or hungry. He must be enjoying the shenanigans, because his head is its natural shade of gray. He has a soft too-whit, too-whit as his call, not a gobble, and he's huge. He's too big for his legs - an unfortunate genetic modification that I didn't understand when I ordered the poults. He's so fat, he looks like one of those 300lb men at the zoo, who use a zimmer frame to hold up their stomachs. At least they try - and so does Christmas, waddling to his feed tray, scooping up huge beakfulls of grain.
We wait until dark and put on our gloves and jackets, even though the night is still warm. I tuck a flashlight in my pocket. We are robbers with chicken crates. We go to the main coop, push the crate in front of us, and close the door behind us. I shine the light on the sleeping chickens, my husband picks up the first one and puts it in the crate. I count. We put ten to a crate, load it onto the trailer, and bring in the next crate. By the last ten chickens, we realize we don't have enough crate space. Ten chickens go into a cardboard box while we rustle up cat carriers and dog cages from the basement. At the end of the night we have 78 chickens, 3 guinea fowl, and one turkey loaded into the garage, waiting for dawn.
TUESDAY my back hurts. I beg my husband to come to the slaughterhouse with me, but he needs his vacation days for the grape crush this year for his winery. My son has new muscles from a year on swim team, and he gets drafted for the job. We leave at 7.30am for Kings Poultry near Troy, Ohio (USDOT inspected, chickens chilled to 40 degrees and sent out on ice) for our 10am appointment. I try not to think about how much I love the chickens, how funny Christmas is, how the guineas protected him with their screeching. I try not to think about how I will have to buy my eggs now from the grocery store, or about the massive freezer in my basement. Most of all, I try not to think about leaving my chickens on the slaughterhouse loading bay, because even though the people there are terribly nice, it means one thing only for my birds.
I wonder how my son is going to take it. He loves Christmas, and used to spend time crouched near his coop just sitting with him. But we gamely unload all the heavy crates, line up our tubbies and coolers, and get our return time: 2pm. I keep saying to myself - this is the food chain. This is the food chain. But I also think - I'm going to become a vegetarian one day, when everyone in the house can eat beans without us stinking each other out. Then I'll be able to keep chickens just for the eggs and for the pleasure of it.
We arrive home at 6pm after problems strapping the empty crates to the trailer. We are exhausted, but still the chilled carcasses have to be unloaded directly from the ice into the freezer. One by one my husband hands me all the birds, and we fill it up. I identify several of them - here are the older girls, the layers, and their rooster, here is the Americauna, they were a bit runty. And here's Christmas - 40lbs of him with the three darker guinea fowls. I think of all the people lined up at our holiday table, waiting with forks.
This is the reality of eating meat. You take a living thing, you cut off its head and scoop out its guts, and then you bake it at 350. This is the reality of the most disposable meat in our culture - the chicken.
WEDNESDAY I can't wake up properly without the rooster's crow. I really miss him. We only got rid of the layers because we want to go on vacation this year, a proper family vacation, and can't leave livestock at home.
It's too quiet around here. I look over at Christmas's coop, and he's not there. He's in the freezer. I wonder what we will have for dinner. It's too early to eat chicken.
MONDAY the guinea hens screeched at the boy-gang of marauding young roosters, who invaded the vegetable patch for my ripening tomatoes. The guineas have no sense of volume. Everything is at high volume - they sound like a high-pitched pitbull barking. Then the old rooster, a Rhode Island Red with a huge black-feathered tail, joins in crowing to protect his tiny harem of five overworked girls. Overworked, because one rooster is more comfortable servicing ten chickens, and mine have developed sore spots which means they need to wear chicken bras - a saddle made of canvas to protect their backs from his spurs. It's all at full volume and I'm wondering what the neighbors think.
The turkey is spectating from his strawbale hutch near the vegetable patch. He's a bronze-breasted, and his head turns red when he's upset or hungry. He must be enjoying the shenanigans, because his head is its natural shade of gray. He has a soft too-whit, too-whit as his call, not a gobble, and he's huge. He's too big for his legs - an unfortunate genetic modification that I didn't understand when I ordered the poults. He's so fat, he looks like one of those 300lb men at the zoo, who use a zimmer frame to hold up their stomachs. At least they try - and so does Christmas, waddling to his feed tray, scooping up huge beakfulls of grain.
We wait until dark and put on our gloves and jackets, even though the night is still warm. I tuck a flashlight in my pocket. We are robbers with chicken crates. We go to the main coop, push the crate in front of us, and close the door behind us. I shine the light on the sleeping chickens, my husband picks up the first one and puts it in the crate. I count. We put ten to a crate, load it onto the trailer, and bring in the next crate. By the last ten chickens, we realize we don't have enough crate space. Ten chickens go into a cardboard box while we rustle up cat carriers and dog cages from the basement. At the end of the night we have 78 chickens, 3 guinea fowl, and one turkey loaded into the garage, waiting for dawn.
TUESDAY my back hurts. I beg my husband to come to the slaughterhouse with me, but he needs his vacation days for the grape crush this year for his winery. My son has new muscles from a year on swim team, and he gets drafted for the job. We leave at 7.30am for Kings Poultry near Troy, Ohio (USDOT inspected, chickens chilled to 40 degrees and sent out on ice) for our 10am appointment. I try not to think about how much I love the chickens, how funny Christmas is, how the guineas protected him with their screeching. I try not to think about how I will have to buy my eggs now from the grocery store, or about the massive freezer in my basement. Most of all, I try not to think about leaving my chickens on the slaughterhouse loading bay, because even though the people there are terribly nice, it means one thing only for my birds.
I wonder how my son is going to take it. He loves Christmas, and used to spend time crouched near his coop just sitting with him. But we gamely unload all the heavy crates, line up our tubbies and coolers, and get our return time: 2pm. I keep saying to myself - this is the food chain. This is the food chain. But I also think - I'm going to become a vegetarian one day, when everyone in the house can eat beans without us stinking each other out. Then I'll be able to keep chickens just for the eggs and for the pleasure of it.
We arrive home at 6pm after problems strapping the empty crates to the trailer. We are exhausted, but still the chilled carcasses have to be unloaded directly from the ice into the freezer. One by one my husband hands me all the birds, and we fill it up. I identify several of them - here are the older girls, the layers, and their rooster, here is the Americauna, they were a bit runty. And here's Christmas - 40lbs of him with the three darker guinea fowls. I think of all the people lined up at our holiday table, waiting with forks.
This is the reality of eating meat. You take a living thing, you cut off its head and scoop out its guts, and then you bake it at 350. This is the reality of the most disposable meat in our culture - the chicken.
WEDNESDAY I can't wake up properly without the rooster's crow. I really miss him. We only got rid of the layers because we want to go on vacation this year, a proper family vacation, and can't leave livestock at home.
It's too quiet around here. I look over at Christmas's coop, and he's not there. He's in the freezer. I wonder what we will have for dinner. It's too early to eat chicken.
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