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Posted on 06/01/2005 7:12:04 PM PDT by HairOfTheDog
New verse:
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Upon the hearth the fire is red, |
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Still round the corner there may wait |
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Home is behind, the world ahead, |
Poultry? Processing?
Processing.
In "Backyard Chicken" circles, we don't butcher our chickens...we "process" them.
;-D
You butcher them, all right! You cut off their heads and drain out their blood and pluck off their feathers and take out their insides! You evil heartless wench!
I'm going to join Peta!
I'm going to light the grill!
;-D
Seriesly though...if we don't cull out the bad chickens, we'll be overrun (someday) with worthless mean chickens. We're very lucky that out of 8 chickens, 5 of them are gentle and 4 of those five are good layers. Puffy is mean and not a pet, therefore her only chance of survival is utilitarian. If she lays, we'll keep her. If she doesn't, we'll utilize her in another way.
We won't be getting any new chickens though, other than meat chickens until we have our bit of land.
Funny, though...even at ShootMoot, I couldn't help but "check on the chickens"...I do it several times a day and if I go somewhere, it's the first thing I do when I get home.
Apologies for using the "b" word. ;-)
Utilize her...sounds so efficient!
Soylent chicken!
Heh heh!
I think it's really funny, it's what they use on the Backyard Chicken forum. These folks get real attached to their chickens, but they're practical too. I mean, one only needs one rooster per flock for fertile eggs and NO rooster if you just want plain eggs!
I guess butcher just sounds too "Freddy Krueger-ish".
Naw, she won't be a pretty meal. We won't even pluck her. Just skin her. She's a stew pot chicken.
I don't really care for her emotionally because she's hurt Joshua more than once. If she's loose in the yard and he sits down on the ground, she just attacks.
She's a mean animal that is socially acceptable to eat. She laid massive eggs and we let her live as long as she did because of it. Today, she laid another hugh egg. If she keeps it up, she can live. But I won't have a mean animal that's otherwise worthless if it's socially acceptable to eat it.
Exactly.
With a horse, dog, and even with a cat, you can train them if they have a bad disposition...you can give a dog obedience training and teach them better manners.
But with livestock, chickens, beef, etc...you really can't. They're just not that domesticated. Behavior problems are often genetic and are culled to prevent that genetic disposition from being passed on. That's probably why we have 5 pleasant chickens and just the one grouch. Buff Orpies are supposed to be the gentlest of the gentle...but Puffy got that aggressive gene somewhere.
Funny, Jar jar is part Leghorn...Leghorns are nortorious for being skittish and flighty. And she is. But she overcomes it to be a part of what we're doing...just because she seems to like being around us! It really is amazing.
The chicken dilemma!
Heh...well, it should never have gotten this far. I should have just stayed with the "one pet chicken per jedi" rule. We would have ended up with Roy and Jar Jar...a brown egg layer and a white egg layer. Instead, we now have five pet chickens!
Once these five have lived out their peaceful lives, it's going back down to just ONE pet chicken per jedi! They can pick it out of the flock (when we have a flock) and as long as they're friendly, they get amnesty!
I really love Benny Hen, though...she's so sweet. She will actually be in the nest box and see me coming and get out of the nest box, teeter over to the side of the coop on the roost and visit with me a while!
I like talking about my chickens. I'm sorry! I haven't really done it to this extent in a while...
;-)
s'okay.
Guess I need to go do something in the yard.
So there!
Ok...
~looking sheepish~
See ya later!
oops
Excuse me...
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