Sunday, December 11, 2011

How to keep a rooster quiet, Micro farm, giant eggs

Scruffy ,smart little hashtag has me jumping through hoops. We had some pretty frosty  weather over the last week.  Some very cold nights.  It is recommend for back yard chicken keepers who do not heat or artificially  light their coops to feed their flock a warm mash  in the morning when the weather temps get below freezing.   I usually  just stick their morning table scraps in the microwave before I give it  to  them. But the last few days  I haven't had any leftovers os I made up some oatmeal  and rice to give to them to warm them up.  Three days in a row I did this.  This morning, its not freezing so I just fed them normally .    Hash was  not ok with this.  He stood at the back door crowing until I came out with warm oatmeal mash.   All is quiet now that I have served the preferred breakfast.  There are two ways to keep a rooster quiet 1. Put them in a dark quiet place and leave them there.  2.  Distract them with food.  I am choosing  NOT to lock Hash in a cave.... no matter how tempting it is.  I am choosing to cater to the whims of a .....chicken........ At least until January 12.  That is the  date that Jimmy and I will take possession of our  beautiful new house on 1 acre.  There.... Hash can crow  all he wants.  Until then I  will  do any dance he wants me too so the neighbors don't complain.   Why don't we solve the problem by having ourselves a nice chicken dinner?  Because  he still rides around on Jimmy's shoulders and  He still crawls into my  lap and cuddles and purrs.
Jimmy and I are very excited about our upcoming move.  We have our micro farm all planned out.   We even have a perfect space for the green house. It comes with several well established fruit trees.  I am already designing my sign for the front: Fresh, Free Range , Organic Eggs, $4 a Dozen.  Its always nice to have the potential to realize a fantasy.
I have some photos of Prissy's latest  clutch of eggs. She  is laying double yolks and they are huge. She  laid one this week that was so big I couldn't shut the carton.

Leghorn Double Yolk from Prissy  'The Benevolent'

Same egg different angle

In the frying pan!

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