4th of July at the Hipster Hen Ranch

It's a fine summer day here at the ranch.  Here's Snowball the Silkie rooster, up close, as he takes a little stroll through the chicken run.

Arlene the Barred Rock is not having a good week.  She's started going through an unusual summer molt, so is sloughing off feathers left and right and is covered in pin feathers.  As though that wasn't enough, she's somehow injured her leg.  There's no wound - it's more like a pulled muscle - and she's limping pretty badly.  I moved her to the broody coop to limit her activity for a while.  She seems to have calmly accepted her fate and is spending the holiday just sitting there in a Buddha-like pose, contemplating the universe.

Speaking of injured birds, in my June 6 Facebook post, I talked about how Willow the buff Orpington had sustained a permanent injury that had slowed her down and made her a huge target for Emile the rooster.  To keep her away from Emile, she's been living in the center part of the pole barn by herself.  Her newest domicile is the small coop with Snowball the rooster, the Silkie hens and the Legbar teenagers.  I am happy to report that she's getting along with everybody there and things are working out better than I imagined.  She has to negotiate a small tunnel (shown here) to get to the pop door and go outside.  She's a big, slow-moving hen, but she's figured it out!  After spending a few weeks by herself in the center of the pole barn, she's happy to be with other chickens again and thrilled to be able to go outside!

Willow peeks out the pop door and say, "Yay!  I can go outside again!"

Meanwhile, Courtney the Silkie hen has become an empty nester in a very real way.  The Legbar teenagers still live in the same coop with her, but they're doing their own thing and no longer need her care or protection.  Here she is, enjoying a solitary stroll through the run.

And here are the kids (from left to right, Paulette, Marissa, Nicky and Bonnie).  They no longer hang out with Mom, but still stick closely together with each other.  

Here's Marissa striking a pose.  The Cream Legbar Standard of Perfection would say that she has too much salmon color on her head and neck, but I say she's turning into a gorgeous hen.

Here's Marissa again - such a pretty girl!

Here's Marissa's sister, Paulette, also a very pretty hen, doing bug and worm recon at the base of an oak tree.  

Meanwhile, over in the big hen pen, Roxie the Rhode Island Red notices a feather out of place on Jennifer's elaborate crest.

"Hold still, dear!"  I'll fix it for you with my beak!"

"Oh, that looks so much better!  You probably even feel better!"

Happy 4th, from me and the hipster hens!

Randy

The Star Spangled Banner

I remember the fear, uncertainty, and horror I felt on September 11, 2001 when I watched the World Trade Towers collapse on TV. I know all of you share that memory and those feelings with me. Now imagine how you would feel if this country was being invaded by an entire force of a foreign power.

In 1814, the British had captured Washington and torched the Capitol Building and the White House. In order to get a firm foothold on the American mainland, however, the British needed to take a major port. So they turned their guns on Baltimore. A young American lawyer was witness to that battle. He had been captured by the British and was being held in a British ship in the harbor. As dusk turned to twilight and then to night, he witnessed wave after wave of shells and rockets barrage Fort McHenry. He knew that if Fort McHenry fell, Baltimore would fall, and then the very survival of the United States of America would be in danger. A large American flag – fifteen stars on a field of blue and fifteen red and white stripes, flew over the fort. When the battle finally ended in the middle of the night, he did not know if it was because the British had been repulsed or if the Americans had been defeated. He stayed awake all night filled with worry and doubt and with the first light of dawn he strained to see through the early gloom and finally with certainty was able to make out the shape, and then with the advance of dawn, the red, white and blue of the American flag. The flag still flew and America still stood. Young Mr. Key was so relieved and so filled with hope and joy that he found a piece of parchment and a pen and quickly composed a poem that he entitled “The Defense of Fort McHenry.” The opening lines are “Oh, say can you see by the dawn's early light what so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?”

You may know the words to this poem. It became our national anthem. We all mouth them before baseball games while we’re mentally comparing the ERA’s of the starting pitchers. I suggest that if you have occasion to sing the national anthem today that you think about the situation that inspired the creation of the anthem. And think about what our country stands for –  of the beauty of the land, from the redwood forests to the Gulf Stream waters, from the purple mountains to the fruited plain; think of our history; how we fought for our freedom and then how we fought to expand that freedom for all who live here and all who come here; think of our people, a diverse group, who often don’t agree on much, but who all agree in the American principles of freedom and democracy and living together peacefully in spite of our differences.  Every once-in-a-while we need to think about all of this and just sort of get worked up about it and allow ourselves to be filled with pride.

I had occasion to visit the Star Spangled Banner – the actual flag that flew above Fort McHenry – when I was at the Smithsonian last year. The flag is still there. It is battle-scarred and it’s showing its age, but there it is. The flag is still there. I left the exhibit with a lump in my throat.

The United States of America is also battle scarred and also showing its age. But there it is. Our country is still there. And I’m proud of it and glad that it is there for each of us.

Happy Fourth of July.

Fear the Chickens!

They have beady little eyes that never seem to blink and they watch every movement you make as you draw near.  Eventually you are surrounded on all sides by these menacing creatures, some with mud-matted plumage, others deformed by patches of missing feathers, and all filling the air with alien-sounding throaty noises.  Then they advance on you, slowly at first, then running, then awkwardly flying with their talon-tipped claws stretching out to tear your flesh.  You drop the egg basket, fall to the ground and cover your face with your hands.  They swarm over your body and peck at your hands with their sharp beaks insistently, relentlessly—but you know that if you move your hands away they will be ravenously pecking your eyes!

Have you ever had this experience while gathering eggs?  Probably not.  Have you ever had these thoughts?  If you have, you may suffer from alektorophobia, a fear of chickens.  No study has ever been conducted to find out how frequently this phenomenon occurs, but from a variety of anecdotal, personal accounts and from people seeking help from mental-health professionals, its obviously a real thing.

My wife, Kathy, created this piece for an art class.  What does it mean?  Who knows!  Is she a closet alektorophobe?  Um….probably not.

The Phone and the Farm Store

My phone is dying. Last Thursday I couldn't get it to dock to my audio docking station, nor would it charge connected to anything. So with my battery slowly draining, I crossed everything off my to-do list for the day and headed off to the phone store.

At the store I explained my problem to the phone store guy and told him I suspected a broken or damaged pin in the docking port and asked him, “Is it repairable or is it time to upgrade to a new phone?”

“Not very likely that any of the pins are broken,” he told me, “Your docking port is probably got some pocket lint, or the pins are just dirty or corroded. Take your phone home and use a toothbrush and some alcohol and try cleaning it up.” (Note this helpful hint for your future use, everybody!)

So I took it home, cleaned it up as he suggested and plugged it into the charger. It made a satisfying “DING!” and started charging immediately. I tried it a few more times & got a ding each time. Yay! Back in business.

Next project: Buying chicken bedding at the local farm store. I loaded Bailey into the shotgun seat of the truck, hopped into the driver’s seat and headed down the road. Once on the way, I plugged my phone into the truck's docking cable so I could listen to some tunes. Nothing happened. The screen remained black. When I pushed the "home" button, nothing happened. And I noticed liquid dribbling out of the bottom of my phone. I surmised that maybe when cleaning the phone I should have sprayed the alcohol onto the toothbrush and not into the docking port. I put the phone down and said a few words that one should not say in front of one’s dog. Fortunately, Bailey is deaf.

Bailey Riding Shotgun

About halfway to the farm store, the phone emitted two dings and “What can I help you with?” along with the wavy lines appeared on the screen. I was in the presence of Siri. Either there was some major cross-connections going on inside the phone due to the alcohol, or Siri had become sentient. Whatever the case, she was very insistent and the phone continued to emit the double dings about every fifteen seconds. I finally started responding with “Shut up, Siri….Shut up, Siri….Shut up, Siri….” To which she finally responded (I swear I am NOT making this up!) “Are you talking to me?” “Yes, Siri,” I replied. “I thought so,” she said. She sounded drunk. Probably due to the alcohol. Then I tried the "home" button again and Siri finally went away. I tucked my mentally unstable phone into my pocket.

At the farm store, I immediately noticed that the pallet in front of the store where the pine shavings are normally kept was empty. The store is never busy on a weekday and when I walked into the store four or five employees were gathered around the checkout desk in the front of the store. Stevie Wonder was blasting from the store’s PA system at high volume. “Party time,” I thought. Everybody turned to look at me. “Do you STILL not have pine shavings in? I asked, “I was here last week and you said they would be in today.” “Sorry,” one of the clerks replied, “The feed truck hasn’t come in yet.” “Well, then I’ll just have to get some straw,” I grumbled. I headed for the back of the store. Stevie Wonder was at top volume in the back of the store as well. It was “Forgivingness’ First Finale” – odd choice for a farm store, I thought. Then I slowly began to realize how odd it was that no matter where I went in the store, the volume of the music was constant. And that’s when I figured out that the music was coming from my pants. I took my phone out of my pocket and hit the"home" button. Nothing happened. Repeat action. Nothing. So I hauled the straw to check out and paid for it while serenading all the gathered staff. “Stevie Wonder,” I told them. “Forgivingness’ First Finale. A great album. You should get it and play it on your PA.” This elicited no response. 

Back in the truck, I listened to the rest of Stevie Wonder and then Sturgill Simpson, The Submarines, Sufjan Stevens, and Susan Tedeschi on the way home. It seemed to be stuck on "S" artists. Bailey heard none of it nor my comments. Fortunately, as I mentioned, she is deaf.

At home, I attacked my phone with canned air and then a blow drier. The music finally stopped. At this point the only thing wrong with phone is that it charges very slowly and won’t dock well – the original problem. It’s time for an upgrade.

Fixing Those Pesky Leaking Chicken Water Founts

Readers:  I'm transitioning my blog to a new platform on Squarespace.  I've updated this blog post and moved it to the new location.  Click here to get there! - Randy

Spa Day in the Coop

Angitou gets ready for a haircut

It has been a busy spring, but a couple of the hens have been in need of some beauty touch-ups, so Kathy and I found some time to set up our chicken spa.  Angitou the golden Polish hen recently completed a spring molt and shed and regrew all of her feathers including the feathers in her beautiful and elaborate crest.  She has a fantastic "hairdo" but unfortunately her crest now completely covers her eyes.  And if we can't see her eyes, that means she can't see much of anything.  Time for a little tonsorial remediation.  Kathy held her in her lap, while I went to work with the scissors.  Angitou was very brave, even when the scary sharp scissors were snipping right around her eyes.  Feathers, like our hair, are dead tissue, so a feathercut is just like a haircut and causes the chicken no pain.  The only thing to avoid is cutting the shaft of the feather too close to the skin, and cutting pinfeathers during a molt.  Pinfeathers are very much living tissue with a blood supply and can bleed a lot if cut.

The Birds and the Bees and the Chickens

If you’ve Googled your way to this blog looking for poultry porn, you’ve come to the wrong place.  Sorry to disappoint you, Foghorn, but this is simply an informational and scientific discussion of chicken mating.

If, however, you are offended by the concept of animals having nonchalant sex in public, this may be the wrong place for you, as well.  I grew up on a farm so animals having sex everywhere – all the time was simply part of my childhood, for goodness sake!  So it’s hard for me to appreciate why anyone would make a fuss about it.  If you’re going to make a fuss, though, just leave now and remember that this is the warped and twisted blog where they talk about vile animals having disgusting relations.