Author: Anna & Mark

Douglas Lain whips up an ad

July 21, 2010 Posts No Comments
“Doug has a great
brain. I am hugely impressed with his prospects to be a completely
uncommercial genius. God help him.”
– Jonathan Lethem, author of Chronic
City



Douglas LainMark “met” Douglas
Lain through their
mutual interest in the physics of consciousness and the
disclosure movement. 
Douglas seems to be the type of multi-talented person we both enjoy —
he puts together a podcast, has a novel coming out from Tor Books in
2011, and is working on a self help book about urban foraging.



It just so happens that
Douglas is also a talented sound editor, and he agreed to put together
a short ad for the Avian Aqua Miser.  Download the
ad and see for
yourself that it’s quite easy to tell a kid is adorable without looking
into his face.

Dark Cornish economics part

July 19, 2010 Posts 4 Comments

Plucking a chickenWe
butchered another third of our cockerels last week, and I decided to
crunch the numbers on these 16 week old Dark Cornish.  You might
remember that at 12
weeks old, our cockerels weighed an average of 2.25 pounds per dressed
carcass, which came
out to a cost of $2.51 per pound.  Our 16 week old birds weighed 3
pounds apiece, and the new weight cost us $4.33 per pound in
feed.  Clearly, letting our cockerels get older makes the feed to
meat ratio worse, not better.



The 16 week old birds
were also considerably spunkier.  I thought it was cute the first
time I saw the cockerels roosting on
the coop roof, but
now I’m wondering how we’re going to capture the last 9 birds before
our last butchering day.  Even worse, when Mark went into the coop
to catch his first chicken on our kill day, the chickens were so big
and vigorous that one accidentally gave him a big scratch across his
face.



I had been considering
keeping a
breeding pair of Dark Cornish to experiment with next
year, but I’ve changed my mind.  I’ve decided we don’t need — or
want — a predator resistant breed, and would instead prefer something
sedate and docile.  So the last 9 broilers are slated for
slaughter this week, and next year’s experiment is simmering on the
back burner.


Our homemade chicken
waterer kept our
broilers well watered.

I love the nipples but the chickens love them more

July 16, 2010 Posts No Comments

Chicks drinking from a bucket watererJamie
from Alaska sent me a photo of his new bucket waterer in action.  He wrote:

I got the chicken nipples
yesterday.  I immediately took a break at work and went out and
hooked them up.  The chickens went right up to them & were
fighting over them!  It was great!  I sent you a picture of
them.  Thanks for the great product!  They only took a week
to get here first class, which is really fast for Alaska.



Meanwhile, Louisa pulled
out a stopwatch, then emailed to say:

I
just wanted to let you know that I received my kit on Friday.  I
was so excited!  Well today while I was at work my husband put the
chicken nipple on a water bottle.  I put it the cage with my 6
week old chicks and I timed them to see how long it would take them to
figure it out.  I was shocked, 1:38 seconds!  Thanks for the
great idea.



David wrote in too:

Just
thought I would take the time to tell you that I love the Nipples but
my chickens love them more.  My egg production increased slightly
and I save better than an hour and a half each day now that I have
eliminated the scrubbing of the water feeders.  I am able to give
them fresh water daily.



Thanks for reporting in,
everybody!  If you haven’t taken the plunge yet, our homemade chicken
waterer kits are
extremely affordable, and — as David says — your chickens will love
them even more than you do.