Chicken out! February 7, 2008

I have recently discovered the joy that is channel 4 on demand. I’m not a huge TV fan, but there have been some really interesting programmes on recently, but alas all have been on channel 4. Being in Wales, and not part of the digital TV age, and refusing on principle to get Sky, we are stuck with S4C. This means that we can watch all the welsh-medium programmes that we like, but get only a very select few channel 4 programmes, and only a few interesting ones that are generally shown at riddiculous times of the night. But, today I finally managed to watch the first episode of ‘Hugh’s Chicken Run’. I know this was just the build up to the horrors that are to come in the next episodes (this evening’s viewing), but I was really horrified by some of the things that it showed…..

 I am prone to sentimentality when it comes to animals, and am quite sure that having my own chickens has influenced my attitude towards the programme, for which I am very glad. The more people know about the food they eat and they way it has been raised the better. The head in the sand attitude is just not an excuse, and fair enough, some people can’t afford to buy free range or organic chickens (the last one I bought cost £11, but it did feed 4 of us well for sunday, Steve and I for dinner on the monday, and then became a soup – rather good value I think). But, there is a simple solution – don’t eat as much! Why do we feel that we have a right to eat what we want when we want it with no regard to the way the animal has been produced. My dad told me that when he was young a chicken for sunday dinner was a luxury, something to look forward to. How have we got so far away from that situation in 50 years?

I am a big supporter of what Hugh and others are trying to do, and really hope that it opens people’s eyes to what our supermarket driven society is becoming. When will more people start to think for themselves, realise that the way we live at the moment is not sustainable, and make decisions about how they can help change things?

I do not, and will not buy two for £5 chickens. If we can’t afford free range then we eat something else!

Rant over…! I’m off to watch the next two episodes whilst eating fresh pasta made with eggs from my ladies, and consider my next project…..giving some battery hens a new home.

Sickly Wonkey September 26, 2007

Poor Wonkey has the sneezes…..she was also making a horrible sound last night when I went to put them away, kind of croaky bark, I was quite alarmed and had a moment of ‘eek, shall I isolate her from the rest incase she has some horrible infectious disease’. I rushed up with a large box intent on putting her in the shed for the night, only to find that she was perfectly happily perched in the house snuggled between Chicken (formerly known as The Other One) and Scaredy. So, I decided to leave her – slight hyseteria possibly, but having only had the chooks for 2 weeks I’m reluctant to have a death on my hands already! This morning we trooped off to the vets (is amazing how difficult it is to find a farm-type vet in this part of rural-ish Wales), to be met with a perfectly nice bloke who admitted that he knew very little about chickens. But he did know that she was incredibly bunged up and has got ‘flu’. Poor Wonkey. So, we now have a little bottle of Baytril and a syringe and have to administer it to her twice a day. I’m tempted, having read lots and lots of chicken/cold/baytril advice on various poultry web pages to start putting it in the water after she’s had a couple of doses, so that the others get some benefit too. Hmmm, we’ll see. I’m going away for the weekend and I can’t imagine Steve will be enormously impressed with the idea of having to administer drugs to a chicken twice a day! I’m also going to start the chooks on pro-biotic yoghurt to help them grow good bacteria whilst the antibiotics are around. Alas, the medicine means we can’t eat the eggs for a couple of weeks, but if it means the chooks stay healthly and live on to lay for a long while to come then we can cope without eggs! Not that we’ve had that many yet anyway, but they are only about 20 weeks old.

It’s been an expensive couple of weeks for animals – Harvey had to have his teeth cleaned and various blood tests last week, costing £200! But, it was worth it as he’s completely fine again now, phew. I thought we were going to loose him for a while there.

Right, off to make some pumpkin soup and watch the rain!

Cwm Chooks! September 11, 2007

Hurrah! We have chickens!! I have been very excited about the prospect of getting chooks for months, and now they are finally here! We have four Light Sussex’s – a traditional British breed. I was very conscious of getting a traditional breed as they are becoming less popular, and consequentially rarer, as people focus on the uber egg production abilities of the hybrid breeds. So, we went to a agricultural show in the spring and chose ourselves a good dual purpose chook who will lay enough eggs to keep two people and a cat happy. They will also be good for roasting at some point (eek!), and my brother has kindly volunteered to undertake the darstardly deed of killing them (he has experience of such things) as and when we require. Hmmm, now they are here I am not sure I’m going to be able to eat them……

So, we have Wonkey (who has a wonkey comb), Black Beak (self-explanatory), Scaredy Chicken (the most timid of the four) and The Other One (no distinguishing features for us to name her by). They are about 18 weeks old and should start to lay very soon. I collected them from a farm way up in the mountains on friday, transporting them home in a box – having the boot of your car clucking is a novel experience! We left them in their house to settle in and then let them out on saturday – they weren’t overly keen to come out but after some initial hesitation they finally ventured out into the sun and onto the grass and were quickly introduced to the joy that it a hearty slug meal! Steve collected a tub full of the slimey blighters and scattered them liberally around the run….mmmm, slug. Well, they think so, something I am very keen to encourage!

Its now just a case of checking every morning and hoping for that first yummy egg…..