So Much Poultry, So Little Time





Homegrown Evolution just got back from the American Poultry Association Annual Meet at the Ventura Fairgrounds. We know nothing about show chickens and we’re too exhausted to blog coherently, so we’ll let the pictures speak for themselves with just a few observations:

-If you don’t want to bother raising chicks, a poultry show is a good place to start a flock and talk to some knowledgeable folks. There were quite a few chickens for sale at reasonable prices.

-Someone needs to put together an urban version of the 4-H club to bring urban agriculture programs to the inner city. Maybe it’s already been done, but from what I’ve been told urban 4-H clubs are all about nutrition, science fairs, and maybe training guide dogs. Kids desperately need contact with nature and animals. Let’s grow some food! But we may need to hippify the uniforms a bit . . .

-When the economy hits the skids people start thinking about keeping chickens. I spoke to the editor of the always informative Backyard Poultry Magazine about this phenomena. She said that she tries to tell people that you should keep chickens in good times and bad (amen!), but that when the economy tanks Backyard Poultry’s circulation soars. We predict Ben Bernanke will put together a coop behind the Federal Reserve.

-And speaking of big things, Jersey Giants are bigger than the national debt.

Stay tuned for some scans of the June 1908 issue of the Poultry Review that we picked up at the meet.

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6 Comments

  1. Sadly, a lot of cities have laws that specifically prohibit the keeping of chickens or other farm animals within the city limits. Knoxville, TN for example specifically forbids it in Section 5 – 102: Keeping of Swine or Poultry of their zoning ordinance (found here: http://www.municode.com/resources/gateway.asp?pid=11098&sid=42 do a search for poultry)

    Until such laws are changed, Urban chicken raising will be problematic for many people.

  2. Since you said you “nothing about show chickens,” here’s some IDs…

    the goose is a Sebastopol
    the ducks are (obviously enough) Cresteds
    the rooster is a White-Faced Black Spanish

  3. Steven–Thanks for the I.D.s! That goose is particularly striking.

    L. Brian–we all need to fight to change these laws. It’s funny that our hens are more regulated than our Doberman Pincher.

  4. I have 6 bantam (mini) hens in my city backyard, in a small coop with a sizable chicken run. It is technically illegal to have “farm” animals in Providence, RI, where I live, but no one’s out scoping people’s yards for them or anything. I initially brought home a rooster too, but decided he might blow my cover once he became old enough to start cock-a-doodle-dooing at the break of dawn. So I ate him. Just kidding. I game him to some country folk.

  5. I dipped my extra Banty male in chocolate and ate him. I loved him while he was alive, but I loved him just as much as the delicious boy he turned out to be. BTW, I couldn’t keep him, we had too many cockerels at the time (one too many Bantam boys in their smaller coop. I still miss that chocolate covered morsel from time to time.

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