Clare_CA

Hi All,

I am now on my way to becoming a vegetarian. I have given up all red meat, pork, and chicken for good. I actually can't believe how easy it is to do and how much better I feel physically. I'm buying soy milk and organic milk and mixing it in with my coffee in the morning. I bought a book entitled "The Kind Diet" after seeing Alisa Silverstone (author) on Oprah. Oprah was reviewing a book called "Food, Inc.," : Amazon.com: Food, Inc.: Eric Schlosser, Robert Kenner: Movies & TV which illustrates the abuses and animal cruelty of animals produced for mass consumption. The camera went to a chicken farm -- the only one that would allow a camera in -- and the chickens were being kept in deplorable conditions. They've done this genetic breeding so the chickens have these huge breasts, but they can't move more than a few inches at a time before falling down, and they are crowded beyond belief. That was the extra push I needed to give up eating chicken. It's just a personal decision that I decided to finally make, and I feel really good about it.

Hope you are all having a great weekend! Thanks for letting me share.

Clare

LilRaverBoi

Great pics, Clare!f Love the variegated naners and the chicks! I see some white crested black polish and other top-hat breeds in there! Yay! Those were always my favorite...I showed them at the county fair and won best of show 2 years even! Egg-wise, they're not the best...inconsistent layers and small eggs...but they're pretty, very docile and fun to raise!

__________________
BANANA RAVE!
Feel the beat from start to stop, dancin' and movin' from bottom to top!
lilraverboi@genxglow.com
RIP Tog Tan. We love you and will always remember you!
I'm Bryan with a Y! There is no 'I' in BRYAN!

srash

Clare,
We are kindred spirits. I have an Ae Ae banana growing in my family room, waiting for it to get a little warmer here in Savannah (I think I must have bid against you several times on e-bay). We built a chicken coop last year and now have 2 aracaunas, 1 barred rock, 1 silver-laced wyandotte, and a rhode island red. We have been harvesting over 2 dozen eggs a week even through the winter. I was stumped the longest time trying to figure out what I would do with 25 chickens, until I found Meyer's hatchery that sends out smaller bunches.
The greenhouse and solar panels are both on my to do list.

Clare_CA

Thanks so much for your comments, Bryan and Srash!

Bryan, that's good information to know. That's neat that you won best of show for two years.

SRash, it's good to know that we are kindred spirits. I hope I didn't bid against you.

Clare

LilRaverBoi

Oooo...we had aracaunas for years too! The blue/green eggs are very cool!

__________________
BANANA RAVE!
Feel the beat from start to stop, dancin' and movin' from bottom to top!
lilraverboi@genxglow.com
RIP Tog Tan. We love you and will always remember you!
I'm Bryan with a Y! There is no 'I' in BRYAN!

cherokee_greg

great I miss having chickens maybe I will get some more I love those bananas !!!!!! Great garden you will have blessed !!!!!!!!! Thanks for posting

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Greg zone 9 Fresno,CA
http://gardenjot.com/garden/view/1980/Gregs-Banana-Farm

novisyatria

i also miss having chickens. they looks beautiful clare

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Novi Syatria
Lab of Tissue Culture , Dept of Forestry, Faculty of Agriculture, Univercity of Bengkulu, Indonesia www.kuljar.com email: novi_syatria@yahoo.com

kemistry

aw the chics are so adorable, reminds me of the 'farmer life' during childhood

i'm also a meat-free eater, too. It's very easy actually

CookieCows

The pictures are great! I love varigated plants. My ae ae is a stuttgart canna.

I miss chickens too!! I love the different colored eggs. We used to have those. Still waiting on our chicken coop to get fixed. I know what you mean about commerical chicken farms and plants. We see it out here.

We aren't vegetarians but when we had chickens they were free range during the day and we like to take our meat from our property instead of promoting the commercial industry. We were happy knowing that the animals here were 'happy while they were alive.' We only have a few beef cattle right now. I miss the days of chickens and milk cow. It would be so cool to be as self sustained as possible.

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Henry

I just want to add that chicken drops are awsome fertilizers

Abnshrek

I'm all for living healthy. I like getting locally grown products. I ended up with a bunch of colored chicks last year for easter thanks to the girls :^)( the local grain co. sells them that way). I have 3 Rhode Island Reds.. So I get 21 eggs a week from 3 chickens if not more. If I feed them grubs they lay 2 eggs a day (a plus of digging & planting stuff in the yard).
I must say you have some very nice looking plants, and healthy looking chicks :^)

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I'm a Nannerhead :^)

djmb74

thanks for sharing Clare!

We are eating fresh eggs everyday now with my flock of egg layers. Eventually going expand the flock as I have a lot of interest from friends and family in getting fresh eggs weekly.

Also its great having the chickens because they are great composter as well. They get most of our dinner scraps and give back some great fertilizer!

I have one Brown Leghorn that has been laying two eggs a day everyone once in a while as well. She lays one mid morning and another right before they go to roost. No mistaking its her because she is my only white egg layer....

She doesn't even look tired does she....

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*PEOPLE WILL FORGET WHAT YOU SAID.
*PEOPLE WILL FORGET WHAT YOU DID.
*BUT PEOPLE WILL NEVER FORGET HOW YOU MADE THEM FEEL!

Clare_CA

Thanks so much for your comments, everyone! I enjoyed reading them.

jeffreyp

I had a couple orpinton hens and they were alot of fun raise. In the evenings they were very docile and you could pick them up and hold them like a puppy dog. I've since moved but I hope one day to again get some hens.

djmb74

I have a few hens that love to tell me its time to come get the eggs. They cluck lick nobodies business until I come and get them.

As far as banana plants my chickens love eating them. So I cannot keep any where they can get to them, they even figured out that they can peck at the stems and get to yummy mushy stuff in the middle. They dig into the roots as well eating any worms they find as well as any roots they get a hold of.

I started 2 raised beds just for them with New Zealand spinach and tons of collard greens. I have a patch that I grow wheat grass for them as well...

They killed three snakes and every lizard and frog they could get as well... The one I took a picture of is the reptile hunter. She is so fast, its funny every time she gets a hold of one all the other chickens chase her around trying to steal it from her.

Here is a great forum all about chickens...

BackYardChickens Forum

__________________
*PEOPLE WILL FORGET WHAT YOU SAID.
*PEOPLE WILL FORGET WHAT YOU DID.
*BUT PEOPLE WILL NEVER FORGET HOW YOU MADE THEM FEEL!

Clare_CA

Oh no, Martin! Thanks for that info. I have bananas plants planted everywhere! Ugh. That could be problematic. I'll have to figure out what to do about that -- maybe a fenced off area. Thanks for that link. I'll check it out.

djmb74

You definitely will want a fenced off run for them, they will eat anything growing that they find yummy after they take a taste. And once they eat everything yummy they will eat everything else that was kinda yummy...

__________________
*PEOPLE WILL FORGET WHAT YOU SAID.
*PEOPLE WILL FORGET WHAT YOU DID.
*BUT PEOPLE WILL NEVER FORGET HOW YOU MADE THEM FEEL!

jeffreyp

they really are sweet animals. It's good to have a rooster as a watchdog they really have a keen sense against predators. In my case I had only hens because I didn't want to annoy my neighbors with morning cokadoodledooos

LilRaverBoi

Yes, very very true! In fact, I don't know of many (if any) things that they WON'T eat. Most people think of chickens as vegetarians...eating corn and grass, etc...but they are definitely omnivores that will eat pretty much any other animals they can catch from bugs and mice to frogs and reptiles.

__________________
BANANA RAVE!
Feel the beat from start to stop, dancin' and movin' from bottom to top!
lilraverboi@genxglow.com
RIP Tog Tan. We love you and will always remember you!
I'm Bryan with a Y! There is no 'I' in BRYAN!

Jack Daw

Interesting. If I had a few spare acres, I would make it into organic food farm combined with free outdoor farm for several types of animals, such as chickens. If, if, if...

Good luck with those chickens, they look so fragile. Are there any cocks or just hens?

Actually, I would create a new ecotop, if I had the time, space and money.

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Thnx to Marcel, Ante, Dr. Chiranjit Parmar and Francesco for the plants I've received.



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