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Current Events => The DUmpster => Topic started by: franksolich on May 22, 2009, 10:48:50 AM

Title: rural and small town primitives discuss keeping chickens
Post by: franksolich on May 22, 2009, 10:48:50 AM: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=268x2546

Oh my.

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Dover (1000+ posts) Thu May-21-09 09:33 PM
Original message

Backyard Coops Make Chicks Chic (NPR - All Things Considered)

May 21, 2009 Â· Chickens aren't just for farms anymore. That's right â€” urban hens are hip. Across the country, city dwellers â€” attracted by the idea of having fresh eggs, a new hobby or even unique pets â€” are keeping flocks.

Allison Adams, writer and avid organic gardener, has a flock of seven hens in the backyard of her home in Decatur, Ga., not far from Atlanta. A few years ago, Adams saw an article about raising chickens and then approached her neighbor with the idea.

"I love fresh eggs. I love having fertilizer production right in the backyard, so I thought, 'Well, if it's legal, I should probably investigate it,' " Adams says.

Adams and her neighbor, Bill DeLoach, converted a lawnmower shed into a chicken coop and got some baby chicks. Their seven chickens are now 4 years old and produce about 30 eggs a week.

And they have names â€” royal ones at that. Adams and DeLoach got clever, opting for a queen theme. Among them are Latifah, Ethel and Lucy (queens of comedy), Mary Flannery (queen of Southern gothic), Liliuokalani (a Hawaiian queen), and even one called "Foraday."..cont'd

Cont'd >>

Listen or Read Here:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=10...

Oh, I dunno.

It seems a lot easier, cheaper, and cleaner just to buy eggs at the grocery store.

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VAliberal (172 posts) Thu May-21-09 09:55 PM
Response to Original message

1. Thanks for the link

I didn't listen to NPR today.

I had suburban chickens as a youngster and am now in process of building a coop and run appropriate for our small town suburb as a means of going greener. Hens turn daily household food scraps into eggs and make very nice pets + fertilizer for the garden. Win win all the way around.

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lib2DaBone (1000+ posts) Thu May-21-09 10:07 PM
Response to Original message

2. I think there is a problem with Roosters...

Chickens are a wonderful thing. However, contrary to popular belief, Roosters crow all night.. not just at dawn. They crow pretty much... any time they want.

If I lived in an apartment next door to a Rooster that crowed at midnight..and I had to get up for work at 5 a.m. ....... this might present a problem.

Selfish liberal prmitive, thinking only of oneself.

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Shallah Kali (1000+ posts) Thu May-21-09 10:41 PM
Response to Reply #2

4. That is why so many laws that permit urban chickens only allow hens

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jwirr (1000+ posts) Thu May-21-09 10:38 PM
Response to Original message

3. Speaking of chickens - a fox got one of our hens yesterday. So we are out for blood UNTIL this morning we see her down but the pond with four little pups. So I guess we are going to end the free range and build a secure pen. We decided if we are going to survive in this new world of ours we will have to learn to live with the wild ones to. I like you coup.

Hey, hey, hey, hey--what's up with this?

What's up with this "surviving" in "this new world"?

Hasn't the 0bamareich been in for circa 120 days by now?

I thought Ma and Pa Kettle in the White House were supposed to take care of any and all problems we have, surviving.

So, what's up with this?

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DU AdBot (1000+ posts) Fri May 22nd 2009, 11:36 AM
Response to Original message

"Build A Chicken Coop"?

My Friends Laughed At Me But Then
Title: Re: rural and small town primitives discuss keeping chickens
Post by: Freeper on May 22, 2009, 10:53:14 AM: Quote
Hey, hey, hey, hey--what's up with this?

What's up with this "surviving" in "this new world"?

Hasn't the 0bamareich been in for circa 120 days by now?

I thought Ma and Pa Kettle in the White House were supposed to take care of any and all problems we have, surviving.

So, what's up with this?

Yeah I swore the lion was supposed to lie down with the lamb after Obama was sworn into office. :lmao:

And damn that bush for making foxes into carnivores and no longer dwelling in peace with chickens.
Title: Re: rural and small town primitives discuss keeping chickens
Post by: AllosaursRus on May 22, 2009, 11:13:43 AM: I buy farm eggs from a gal at work. Much better than storebought Coach!
Title: Re: rural and small town primitives discuss keeping chickens
Post by: franksolich on May 22, 2009, 11:25:15 AM: Quote from: AllosaursRus on May 22, 2009, 11:13:43 AM
I buy farm eggs from a gal at work. Much better than storebought Coach!

Well, yeah, sure, that's an option I've used before.

This is the Sandhills of Nebraska, overabundant in agricultural produce, underabundant in people.

We have real farmers' markets out here, not those faux "markets" as in blue states, where the stuff is grown in Florida and shipped up to New England.

From the end of May until the end of September, it's hardly needed, to go into a grocery store for fresh fruits and vegetables and even eggs--no unsafe milk, though--because there's some sort of "self-service" stand on the highways about every half mile or so.

There aren't, strictly speaking, farmers' markets for meats--beef, pork, poultry, dead fish--but one can buy that stuff if he knows someone who raises livestock, all legitimate and aboveboard, unlike the primitives of New England buying tainted meat from convenience-store parking lots.

Of course eggs bought this way are better, but if it's winter, I'm not going out of my way to deal with chickens for eggs; just easier to go to the grocery store.
Title: Re: rural and small town primitives discuss keeping chickens
Post by: GOBUCKS on May 22, 2009, 12:01:50 PM: A lot of people around here are keeping chickens, because among the illegal Mexicans the only sport that rivals soccer in popularity is cockfighting. It's not uncommon to see fields of an acre or so, covered with barrels, with a single chicken tethered to each barrel. That's not an egg farm.

Last weekend they raided a cockfight nearby, but only around 200 spectators were slow enough or dumb enough to get arrested, half of them small kids. Many more escaped into the woods. Hundreds of fighting chickens were confiscated. The fights go on every weekend without interference, so someone must have screwed up badly. They were common long before the swarms of Mexicans, and they're much more common today.

Unfortunately, fighting cocks usually look kind of scrawny for the table.
Title: Re: rural and small town primitives discuss keeping chickens
Post by: AllosaursRus on May 22, 2009, 12:13:53 PM: Quote
Unfortunately, fighting cocks usually look kind of scrawny for the table.

Yep, muscle like that doesn't make for good eating chickens.
Title: Re: rural and small town primitives discuss keeping chickens
Post by: delilahmused on May 22, 2009, 12:21:40 PM: Quote from: GOBUCKS on May 22, 2009, 12:01:50 PM
A lot of people around here are keeping chickens, because among the illegal Mexicans the only sport that rivals soccer in popularity is cockfighting. It's not uncommon to see fields of an acre or so, covered with barrels, with a single chicken tethered to each barrel. That's not an egg farm.

Last weekend they raided a cockfight nearby, but only around 200 spectators were slow enough or dumb enough to get arrested, half of them small kids. Many more escaped into the woods. Hundreds of fighting chickens were confiscated. The fights go on every weekend without interference, so someone must have screwed up badly. They were common long before the swarms of Mexicans, and they're much more common today.

Unfortunately, fighting cocks usually look kind of scrawny for the table.

I hope they catch the ringleaders. Cockfights (even unplanned ones that happen around the farm) are violent, bloody, and unending. One of my best roosters lost an eye (the rooster that did it ended up in the soup pot). I trained one of my dogs to break up cockfights. She's very good at it and relishes the job. Aggressive roosters don't last long around here.

Cindie
Title: Re: rural and small town primitives discuss keeping chickens
Post by: Defiant1 on May 22, 2009, 12:43:36 PM: Quote from: delilahmused on May 22, 2009, 12:21:40 PM
I hope they catch the ringleaders. Cockfights (even unplanned ones that happen around the farm) are violent, bloody, and unending. One of my best roosters lost an eye (the rooster that did it ended up in the soup pot). I trained one of my dogs to break up cockfights. She's very good at it and relishes the job. Aggressive roosters don't last long around here.

Cindie

Do you chop their heads off with an axe or grab them by the head and spin them?
Title: Re: rural and small town primitives discuss keeping chickens
Post by: AllosaursRus on May 22, 2009, 05:48:03 PM: In my experience the axe works the best, followed by the big washtub so they don't flail around uncontrollably.
Title: Re: rural and small town primitives discuss keeping chickens
Post by: diesel driver on May 22, 2009, 06:03:18 PM: Quote
jwirr (1000+ posts) Thu May-21-09 10:38 PM
Response to Original message

3. Speaking of chickens - a fox got one of our hens yesterday. So we are out for blood UNTIL this morning we see her down but the pond with four little pups. So I guess we are going to end the free range and build a secure pen...
You had better off the fox AND the pups, because in a few months, you will have 5 foxes after your chickens, secure pen or not....

Trust me, that fox and her pups don't give a hoot in hell about you or your chickens, to them, they are an easy meal, plus, foxes, raccoons, skunks, etc. in these parts tend to carry rabies....

So you'd better make up your mind which ones you want, the chickens and eggs, or the "cute" foxes....
Title: Re: rural and small town primitives discuss keeping chickens
Post by: RobJohnson on May 23, 2009, 03:36:16 PM: Quote
We decided if we are going to survive in this new world of ours we will have to learn to live with the wild ones to.

I thought Obama put a stop to foxes killing chickens.
Title: Re: rural and small town primitives discuss keeping chickens
Post by: delilahmused on May 24, 2009, 02:36:44 PM: Quote from: Defiant1 on May 22, 2009, 12:43:36 PM
Do you chop their heads off with an axe or grab them by the head and spin them?

We shoot them in the head with a pistol.

Cindie