And The Fight Rages On.........

A buddy of mine, we'll call him, "Timmy 2 Puff" sent me this article...

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124761681413642361.html

So, if you've read this, I still want to reiterate something. I think people who use arguments, like Terri Frohnmeyer, who says, "what's next llamas, goats.... get a farm!". This is the ultimate in fallacious arguments and ultimately makes her look ignorant, which is just desserts, but painful nonetheless. Why? because people like this get air-time. Terri is probably the loudest person at the party, the one who sits on every committee in town, the one who claims she can bake, cook, win Wimbledon, parent better, run faster, grow better vegetables and designed the space shuttle. It kills me, they are not thinking about the truth, they are xenophobes who know nothing about the bird, the value and the real symbiosis with nature chickens have.

Next are government officials and you know how I feel about this. I loathe the official that gets sucked into group think. One official says "chickens are evil!" and the rest echo the mantra. OK, I confess, I am generalizing, but I have to say, when one says.... "Hey neighbor who ratted out your neighbor for chicken keeping.... beat it, go do something positive for the world and get happy, don't waste our time!" Oh my how refreshing this would be. The counter to this is: What is the chicken-keeper doing? Growing weed? Running a meth lab? Breeding cocks for fighting? No, they are raising chickens!

People really need to get a life....

So the positive... raising chickens is incredible. I watched, with wonder, before shooting off to San Francisco to the InterSolar Show, as the chickens ate spiders and clipped my weeds!

Watching the Tour de France... what beautiful country. I need to go there and do the chicken blog from there on my bike while eating brie and sipping a nice Bordeaux!

Solar or Not To Solar...

I love the sun and so do chickens... purportedly chickens that run on the beach, frolick around pools and work out in the sun, produce healthier eggs. Amazing, you mean we shouldn't slather them up in SPF 150 and put a hat on them and send out for 10 minutes before herding them back into the coop for protection? I know, we can create a whole line Chick Sun Shirts - you know the ones that all the kids are wearing now for swimming. What a paranoid trend this is - these kids look utterly ridiculous running around a swimming pool with an outfit on.. a little swim blouse. You know the sun is our enemy and you will die - so go buy another 30 tubes of goo!!!

No....the sun is good - Yes very good... Vitamin D, Omega-3 and Vitamin E all show higher levels in cage-free sunnyside up chicken eggs, versus those standard grocery store eggs. I think our kids would not be so paranoid too, if we let them be kids versus letting become videots with white talcum powdered skin. Ergo, let them be free as well your kids.

This thinking has led me to the idea of a solar powered coop. I fumbled around the web looking to see what and who had done what, and surprisingly like many solar hopes, is a tough egg to scramble. Heating a coop with solar is nearly impossible - here is an example. A 250w IFR lamp, which is what is recommended to keep chicks warm throughout the night, would only run about 4 hours on one PV cell... a full-size PV cell. So to run it all night, two cells would get the job done. So, who wants to drop $1600.00 to power a heater in a coop? Not me. The standard PV cell is 800w and costs nearly $800. So, let's look at another sustainable way to heat the coop. Solar water heater, pushing warm water through the hens roost floor and a section of the bottom floor. Keeping in mind, the coop would need to be properly insulated during the winter. With another smaller PV cell, power a small light, manage water via sprinkler contoller as well, run a small fan through the coop during warm days, just to maintain air flow. I have read where you can also install a thermostat to control a mister mounted to the perimeter of the coop to keep air temps down - some say as much as 15 degrees. Anyway, being sketched out right now and for eventual posting will be a radiant floor and roost powered by solar water heater - this one is HUGE, but smaller are available with updates coming. If I was smart I would figure out how to use iRobot vac to suck the manure up and deposit it in the compost heap. Wait that's what kids are for...