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Di from Wild Harvest Rural Crafts Training just dropped me a line to say she is holding a Wild Food Walk in York on June 1st at 1030 and asked if any of us would be interested. I can’t make York then but at £4 a head and under 12s free if anyone is up there it looks like a very useful course. Details can be found on her site Wild Harvest Rural Crafts Training. Might be an opportunity to meet like minded people who don’t read web pages like ours. Additional viewpoints are always worthwhile. Chickens have been in place a week now. The second and third laid eggs on day two. So for most of the week we have been collecting three eggs a day. Three very diffirent eggs, large, a larger medium and medium. The chickens are very friendly and follow you around when you are out the back. Everything you have has to be tested in case it is food and they peck everything at least once, including the baby. They reside very comfortably with the rabbit but evicted him from his own home. They can be quite intimidating for kids as they rush up to you all pleased to see you, if you shoo them away they run away but staying still just makes them stand by you looking expectantly up for food. If you try and catch them they run away and they can run fast but they can easily be trapped as they come right up to you if you put your hand out. When caught they may squawk but they just stay there and don’t every try and attack you. No wonder people say chickens are ideal as dual purpose pets. Moving the run around is a must but as it is heavy it is a two man job. A weeks worth of them browsing turning a grass patch into a completely barren patch. They need moved around daily really. As the back garden is sealed off I can let them out and they can wander where they want. Only thing is they are very nosey so if you leave the back door open they will be in looking for something else to eat. The main bit of course is in the pudding or in this case the eggs themselves. Very tasty and a very much stronger yellow yolk. I won’t be buying any from the shops from now on. If I need more I’ll buy another bird. All in all so far a very easy way to become self suffiicent. Doesn’t have to be expensive if you make your own coop but imo chickens are a worthwhile investment no matter how much you spend. One thing that I get asked a lot is what do I do about Nuclear survival, survival after an asteroid etc. Specific details on a specific subject. I usually ask them what they see as the answer and then work from there. Myself, I see my general preps covering me for 95% of the situations I can see being of significant risk to prep for. The other 5% are specific issues that require specialist equipment and, in my opinion, the chances of survival are greatly reduced unless you have very specialist equipment. The general preps cover me for economic events, EMP, general social unrest etc. longer and colder winters, hotter and longer summers which I see as the most likely events now. Only once I am 100% sure I have covered my preps will I start to look at specialist areas. For example Nuclear. An invisible killer after the initial bright lights, which you may never see. Radiation can be carried by the winds to your home and you become ill and die, never knowing what has happened. Even if you get specialist gear to detect the radiation you still have to live in such a way that the radiation cannot get to you. Six months in a bunker may be feasible for some but eventually we will all be forced out regardless of if the radiation is still there or not. Even then you never know when a storm can bring some back to you. I believe that you can prepare for a short nuclear event with minimal fallout but we just don’t have the resources to stay in a bunker for 15 years. Myself, I have a geiger counter, air filters and the polythene sheets, etc. to cover us and keep us safe for several weeks. After that then we will just have to take our chances. Unless this lottery ticket I have in my hand is a good one then I don’t have the option. I see biological and chemical events pretty much in there as well except I don’t have any detectors for those. The reason I have these items are from when I was prepping previously. Nuclear was the main threat. You had to build your own bunker and stock it up. Most of the realistic concerns now about people scavanging from you was not even thought of. It just wasn’t cricket you know. Society has changed and we are now looking at these threats realistically. Floods can be covered by boats for example but I don’t see flooding being that likely and event. I’ll still try and cover it by acquiring a boat and preparing for bugging out by sea. Not spent much on that option at all yet. Polar shifts, alien invasion, zombies, etc. each have their own challenges which are unique to those events. You decide which ones you think and then investigate what you need to do to survive them. In my opinion though make sure you have covered the general 95% first. I’d decided that I’ve prepped enough and now was the time to bite the bullet and get my, hopefully, first chickens. Bought a coop, built a run and bought food and water dispensers, some food and other sundries. Build them all up and put them in a nice place in the garden. Then off I went to get my birds. Bit of a hiccup as most of the roads were closed because some dickheads had decided to run a half marathon on them so it took me three times as long to get to the Poultry Fair at Charlies in Queensferry. When I got there I spent a bit of time talking to the man about his birds, looked around and it seemed to me that the fastest selling and most popular birds were Warrens. I’d never heard of them but they look just like chickens should be and came with good feedback from some of the people there. A good starter bird and regular layer.
So I bought three Warrens at Point of Lay and they were put into boxes for the journey home. As everything was already set up I wasted no time and started to unload them into their new home. Then I hit the first problem the third one fought and escaped my clutches. I thought I was in trouble while I chased her around trying to retrieve her but noticed she didn’t run too far from her sisters and with that knowledge I opened the run and she ran straight in. Two minutes later all three were pecking the ground for grubs and wandering around unconcerned. Talk about settling in. I put the rabbit in the run as well to see how they reacted and they clucked a bit, one pecked him a couple of times but they soon ignored him whilst he browsed. The only action came from the cat who wandered up and sat down watching them whilst they clucked away in alarm. The cat just sat watching them and eventually fot fed up and walked away. The chickens clucked all the time the cat was there. After a while we just left them to themselves and they just wandered around the run exploring and eating. I’ve just gone outside, its 2010, and they have moved into the coop for the night. They seem to be ignoring the perches and sitting on the floor although I did note that one of them has laid their, and my, very first egg. Whoo Hoo. My most expensive egg so far but they should get cheaper. Should be interesting seeing how they do on their first night. I’m not expecting any trouble but you never know. |
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