Wednesday, April 06, 2005

Chickens

At 6:30 this morning, we received a call from our neighbors saying that they were heading out to pick up our chickens. By 7:00 we were the caretakers of 55 brand new baby chicks. Extremely loud for the first hour or so, they have quieted down to an endurable volume! So the Erber family is venturing into farming, sort of - for a few weeks. 'Cause, see, these little critters ain't no pets or nothin'. They're food, or will be soon. In the meantime, we just hope to keep 'em alive and get 'em growing!


12 comments:

Kim said...

Congratulations on the new arrivals! I am sure they will enjoy the famous "Erber hospitality".........for at least a little while, anyway......

Shall we start sending in our favorite chicken recipes?

Mrs. K

The Clerk said...

Better yet, bring the recipes in person and share a chicken dinner with us! There'll be plenty!

Jessica

The Serven Clan said...

Did they come to the Post Office? We have only done meat chickens once, but over the past 13 years our "egg" chickens have graced the local P. O. every year or so. The workers get such a kick out of it. : )
Rebecca

Justin Kelly said...

Pictures of nice fluffy chicks may be nice and all, but I want to see Josh and Jonathan engaged in the butchering process! That will be something to see :)

The Clerk said...

Yeah Justin, that will be something to see. But I can't wait to see them on my plate!

Speaking of food, I think it's time for a three o'clock snack.
:-}

NOT THE CHICKS.

Jonathan

Eleganza Strings/ The DeLadurantey Family said...

Congratulations! Chickens are fun, we have had the adventure of raising meat chickens many times. By the end of those few weeks we have always been good and ready to eat them! Somehow there never was too strong of a bond between human and chicken:)

Sarah

Ryan Kelly said...

8-0

Love to eat...but to keep?

Bet they can't play baseball!

Anonymous said...

Will you butcher them all? Or will you spare a few and start your own brood next year?

Did you make them a pen (is that what you put chickens in?) or a coop (isn't that just what they sleep in?--we're city folk, go easy) or are they free-ranging? (That does just mean running loose, right?)

They are awfully cute. I think they'd be fun to watch all day while they're small but I've heard chickens are mean creatures.

So what are you going to name your farm?

The Clerk said...

Wow! Chickens are quite a topic of conversation! :-) We were out of town over the weekend, so here are the answers to everyone's questions:

Yes, they came through the post office, but as our neighbors picked them up, I'm not sure what the workers thought!

Anthony, the chicks are some sort of Cornish-cross! But as you know, I ain't the farm girl in the family!

We will be butchering them all. They actually won't survive much more than 8-10 weeks before dying naturally anyhow. And we certainly do not want to take care of them for more than that. In fact, that's why we got meat birds and not laying hens. We travel WAY too much to have animals.

We made them a sort of enclosed pen that they can roam around in out in the yard. Hopefully we'll be able to keep all the 'coons away!! Ugh.

Jessica

Anonymous said...

Anthony,

I think they are cornish cross boilers. :-) YUM!

just kidding

Anonymous said...

Next time we come over for dinner, can we have hamburgers? :)

The Clerk said...

You aren't up for a fresh, juicy, flavorful chicken dinner?? :-) I guess we could fix something else!

Jessica