the natural progression of things

Hi there all

Just a trip down memory lane for me right now. After two glasses of wine, up came the memories of the property in Enderby in Canada where we used to live. The reason this came up was because most of our neighbors in the city have chickens, and that spurred our memories of when we used to have chickens. Oh, those marvelous memories. It has been said that chickens are only a gene or two away from Dinosaurs....... Well after raising them, I beleive that. I can honestly say, if given the choice, to raise chickens again, it would be a decisive.... NO. or any poultry for that matter, although I did like the heritage turkeys and the ducks. Overall, poultry smells in a way from other animals, that I can do without. I would rather smell my fresia, thank you very much. Raising chickens was a good lesson, but not one that I desire to repeat. OK. The fun with the turkey goes like this..... I was selling a fabulous print/painting at the house in Enderby, when the buyer and I hear Dane (then about 10 years old) yell on the top of his lungs," Oh, S--t. consequently followed by a loud feathery ruckass and a stomping of feet and more yelling. Then while I am holding onto the pen and the painting/print there come flying into the kitchen from the living room a beautiful white and black heritage turkey flapping and a squacking followed by a rather enthusiastic 10 year old boy chasing the tarnation out of the turkey and out the kitchen door. A sale to remember. All I could remember saying was, thats life on the farm.

But to carry on with chickens, Rob believed in relatively free ranged chickens living off natural foods. Our chickens were in absolute peak fitness and health. Every two days, we would move the chicken tractor, a cage for the birds on wheels, till the chickens had fresh grass and bugs and then move it again when needed. The following spring there would be a dark green drunken line across the hay field from where the chickens had been. They would strip the area clean, not a thing left. They also ate everything in sight, from mice to grass hoppers. One year we had a bumper crop of stink bug. Horrible little creatures, that fly like drunken pilots through the air and usually land in your hair or on a light bulb where they cook. They also nest in disgusting colonies with the lady bugs, when you find them there are about a thousand of the creepy crawly things usually in the house or in your wood pile. Yuck. It turns out that our chickens loved the stink bugs to the point of anxiously waiting for this treat. The kids would unhappily find a colony and trod over to the chicken tractor and the chickens would go wild. They would tear at them and have a great old time. But we would only thing about the fact that they were one or two genes away from dinosaurs, and we were glad that they were no longer taller than us. Chickens are voracious and carniverous creatures, and if you don't agree you haven't had them. The one other fond memory that I have is when Rachelle after being rather teenager like and snotty fell right into the chicken poop. Lesson: Don't beak off at your mother. Sorry about the pun, but I couldn't resist.

We had turkeys, ducks, geese, and chickens..... The duck were cool too. We called them Mr. and Mrs. Duck. They kept us humored for the length of time that we had them for. Mrs. Duck would decide that she was hungry, she would quack at him and demand that he follow her to the living room window, where she would tap her beak on the window till someone fed them some seed. It would happen several times a day. Even if Mr. Duck was not finished with his treat she would quack and he would scurry by her side and escort her to the pond. Eventually one day, there was no Mr. and Mrs. Duck. We think that he could no longer live in a matriarch society and called the coyotes over and committed a murder suicide.
The Turkeys were cool, not like what every one says, they were smart, they were also heritage birds. They decided to visit the neighbors one day where our neighbor kindly callled us over to retrieve, and when we went to herd they to our house, they took flight. Now, they are a relatively flightless bird, but they flew two properties over to our house. It was like watching Canadian geese fly. They took off for the winter and we think hid in the mountains. The following spring one came home. We bought her a boyfriend, she laid eggs and had a broud of babies. To protect his family, he sacrificed himself to the coyotes. The mother and the babies survived. But by then we had sold the farm and we took them to a new home.

I have one more animal to add.... the cat. Sassy, she was a cat to contend with. She was very small, but what a fighter. That little girl would come home with weasels. If you know anything about weasels, the cat normally looses. She also ate packrats and would leave the brushy tail ends on the front stoop to prove her worthiness. She also ate boundless mice, which she only ate the heads and upper torso's and leave the rest either in the play ground or again on the front stoop. She would also occassionally go for the birds, but after Dane and I took the survivors to the bird hospital, she wouldn't bring them home any more. We had brought home kittens, to help her hunt and keep her company. We think she didn't like that idea and arranged for the kittens to disappear. Usually, they were about 6 months when we didn't see them anymore. I hate to tell you this but we went through 10 kittens before we got the idea she probably had an arrangement with the coyotes to remove the unwanted competition. When we sold the house the clause was that she remain on the farm, where it was her home to spend the rest of her days. She was 11 when we said good-bye. We figure the new owners, probably don't have any of their own cats left, because if she got them outside her helpers would remove the competition. Oh well.......

Talk with you all later
Robin