"I hate a flogging rooster"

That's what Ruby Thewes (Renee Zellweger's character) in Cold Mountain says to a terrified Nicole Kidman just before wringing the bird's neck.  That's also what Pepa said when Bryan told him about my recent encounters in the chicken coop.  Now I've known since shortly after we got this rooster that he wasn't all that bright, so I really shouldn't be surprised at his recent senseless behavior.  Within a few weeks of bringing him home, I dubbed him "Forrest Gump" because, at the time, though lovable, he seemed to have an even-smaller-than-a-pea brain.  For instance, he'd run up and down a path in front of the coop, trying to get in through the cage wire instead of going just a little bit more to the left to the wide-open door.  But his latest act has repeatedly proven two things:  (1) he indeed has no sense and (2) he ain't all that lovable after all.

I'm not sure if he thinks I'm one of his hens, a threat to his flock - angry that I retrieve eggs and clip wings - or if I'm just trying to impose logic or reason onto a numskull animal.  He flogs me ... present tense, continuing ... not just once, not just in certain circumstances.  No.  All. The. Time.  Every time I go into the coop or let the birds out to graze.  He even chases me down sometimes when, no lie, my back is turned.  This is not paranoia - the chicken's out to get me.  I must say, regardless of his reason, or lack thereof, for acting a fool, it really peeves me -- bringing to mind the phrase "don't bite the hand that feeds you."  I give them food, water, fresh straw to nest on; I clean out their coop and feed them scratch right from my hand - yes, he'll eat scratch from my hand, then turn around and flog me when I stand up.  I've even refused to let Belle eat him no matter how much she paces on the other side of the fence as though working up momentum for a clearing jump - and believe me, I've been tempted many times to accidentally-on-purpose unlatch that gate and turn my back.

The matter was at its worst, a few weeks ago, leading me to ponder how hard it could be to wring a chicken's neck and salivating on the idea of farm-fresh chicken-n-dumplings.  It started with me getting in a fight with the rooster and ended with me getting an x-ray.  So I guess the rooster won that round.  He started in on me and wouldn't quit despite my yelling and advancing toward him - picture a puffed-up chest and "you wanna piece of me" attitude.  I'd had enough, so I reared back on one foot and swung away with the other - dead-set on planting the sole of my boot upside the rooster's noggin.  Well, it's a small target.  I missed and bent my not-so-sure-footed foot sideways so that the leg that had been holding me up was now resting on the ball of my ankle against the concrete coop floor.  Even through boot, that wasn't comfortable.  So I limped on my pride and one good foot back to the house.  The next morning I had to stop by the doctor's office for a blood pressure check and, since I now get special ultra conservative treatment (a whole other story), they weren't taking any chances on me - sending me directly to hospital radiology to be certain I didn't chip a bone.  Turned out there was no chip, just likely a bruise on the bone and definitely one on my ego, which took several days of anger, Advil and hobbling around to finally fade away.  For the time being, rooster had gotten a reprieve.

Last night, the stay of execution ended, and I got my first "taste" of wringing a rooster's neck.  It ain't fun that's for sure and there wasn't any sense of satisfaction once the deed was done.  Honestly, it was like the death scene in a B movie - just when you think dude's dead, he grabs your leg and gasps one more time.  Who knows how long I sat there fingers gripped tightly around a lifeless neck waiting for one last flailing.  And, yes, we did have chicken for dinner, but it was flash frozen instead of farm-fresh - just something about that flailing didn't seem all that appetizing to me.

We Have Chicks!

No, not from the eggs I was so excited about in the last post.  Nope, I bought these chicks.  21 of them to be exact.  That'll teach Bryan to send me off on my own to the flea market for farm animals!

I'd been "chatting" with a lady in a Yahoo! Group and on the phone about checking out the chickens she had for sale and we decided to meet up at the local flea market this past Saturday morning.  I'd done my homework and, based on the size of our current chicken coop, I figured we could easily add half a dozen or so hens to the flock without overcrowding being an issue.  Bryan seemed okay with this idea but chose to stay at home to "work on the fence" while I went shopping for some chickens at 7 a.m. on a Saturday.

When I met up with this new chicken lady (well, she's not really a chicken lady since she's trying to "get out of chickens" and narrow the focus of her farm but aneeywayyy...), I looked around at the chickens she had out on display but didn't see any that fit the description of the ones we'd talked about.  See, when we were talking, I wasn't thinking chicks.  Guess I should have but I didn't.  No matter though, once I saw the chicks, which were hiding out in a brooder box in the back seat of her truck (to stay warm), I became a chick momma.  I brought home 18 Rhode Island Red chicks and 3 cross-breeds of some sort.

So now our garage (which I just started parking in this week - finally!) smells like chickens (or rather like chicken pee and poop) because these little ones are 2 weeks old, still have to be under a heat lamp and separated from the older flock.  Over the next month or so, we'll be watching them to see signs of which are roosters and which are hens (though I'm convinced one of the cross-breeds is definitely a rooster (read: stubborn rooster)).  Of course, this means we're going to need at least one other coop - 'cause you can't have two roosters together - or I suppose you can but it won't be pretty.

I'm pretty sure I recall Bryan's initial response being something along the lines of "what were you thinking???"  I'll tell you what I was thinking: I had to drag my "not-a-morning-person" butt out of bed, drive in the dreary cold with no coat because I forgot (not his fault, but still), go by myself to a place I'd never been before hunting for a lady I'd never seen before and, well, look ...

Need I say more?

I'm supposed to be going this weekend to Oklahoma to pick up another goat (a Nigerian Dwarf buck, so we can breed him with Milky and Prada), but I think Bryan's having second thoughts about me going alone.  He mumbled something about me coming home with a truck load of goats and suggested Bryanna go with me.  That's fine, she and I can make a mother-daughter trip out of it ... 'course it could just mean double (or triple or quadruple) trouble.  Hmm, I wonder if we'll get a discount on multiple goats...

We Have Had Have Eggs!

We have eggs! Woohoo! I've been very anxious, since before Christmas, for our hens to start laying. When we got them in early October, we were told that they'd just started molting. So I started counting the weeks to when we should start getting eggs from them. When we got back home from our New Years' trip, there was a pretty brown egg laying in the nest. The next morning, there was another. I was so excited. I jumped up and down ... really. Bryan laughed at me. Then, the next day - no egg. And the next. And the next. Nothing. I must admit, I was a little bummed. But this morning, one of the hens had left me a present in the nest and this afternoon there was another! Yippee! Now, we'll see if I'm still jumping tomorrow.

Ode (sort of) to Cookie

"Cookie"

December 28, 2009 - January 6, 2010

We brought "Cookie" home with us from Bryan's mom's house in Alabama this past weekend.  A tiny little pygmy kid, she was just born on December 28, 2009.  On the trip home, we named her "Cookie" because the contrast between her ears and her body coat looked like an oreo cookie.   

Once we got home, we put her in the goat pen with Milky, Prada and Max.  She didn't miss a beat, hopping through one of the holes on the cattle fence panel and taking home.  We tried to chase her down, each coming at her from a different direction, until she did the unthinkable.  She ran straight for the creek and jumped right in.  We couldn't believe it.  It was like 30 degrees outside and that was completely dry!  She swam for a minute and then started failing.  Bryan jumped in (oooh, the hell he caught from his dad over that later).  He got her out and stripped out of his wet clothes down to his undies.  While he got himself to the house and back to a normal body temperature, I brought Cookie to the house to make sure she was warm and dry before nightfall.  I was a little nervous about leaving her out for the night but we shut all three of the goats up in the goat house and they snuggled together.  The next day, Bryan spent the better part of the day, in snowfall, tying chicken wire around the outside bottom of the goat pen.

Because we took her away from her mom before she was weaned, I've been bottle feeding her kid milk replacement 3-4 times a day.  Or at least I've been attempting to.  The first few times, she fought so much I don't think she got more than a drop.  Finally, though, she seemed to be getting some and even seemed to enjoy me holding her; she'd lean into me, resting her head on my chest while I squatted in the goat house to feed her.  Cookie also started eating a little hay and straw and even wiggled her head into the food bowl to get some grain.  No wonder Prada head-butted her.  We were thinking that she was too little to be eating the grain or hay but didn't think it could really hurt anything.


Surprisingly, we think she bonded more with Max (the Anatolian) than she did with Milky and Prada (the Nigerians).  At first, she followed Milky around a bit and we thought she might even try to feed, which would have been futile since Milky's dried up right now.  She pretty much stayed away from Prada, though, probably because Prada rammed her every chance she got.  We're starting to think Prada's going to be "herd mama."  The other night, though, Cookie started rooting around at Max ... and he just rolled over and let her do it!

Last night, she sat in my lap and drank from the bottle of kid milk; when I put her down, she followed me around for a bit.  This morning, when I went out to feed her, I found her lying in the corner of the pen, cold and stiff.  I'm not sure if the cold got her; if it was the stress of the move; if it was related to her polar bear swim; or if she had some sort of digestive blockage, perhaps from eating grain too early.  Truth is, I'll probably never know.

Tonight we're in for more freezing temperatures, so I spent the early evening doing some shift work around the farm.  The dogs are in the garage and the goats (Max fits in this category) are in the workshop.  Man, we need a barn!

Today, I didn't much enjoy being Farmer Steph, and I'm certain they'll be more days like this; this is life on a farm.  But tomorrow is a new day and I look forward to being greeted by some warm noses (Milky and Prada give Eskimo kisses in exchange for animal crackers! Hey, I'm not above bribery.)