I have discovered that
chickens do quite a bit more
than drop eggs. They have
other virtues as well. I suspect
for those who have
raised chickens the novelty
has worn off a bit. But for
me the experience is new
enough that every day
seems to present us with
interesting occurrences.
A friend bequeathed us
with a fancy metal, two tiered
nest box `condo.’
About a week before we expected
the `girls’ to start
laying I filled each box with
fresh cedar shavings. Cedar
is supposed to be a bit more
mite-retardant than pine,
according to the chicken experts
I consulted. Our first
clutch of eggs appeared
when we were away. Our
chicken minder discovered
the eggs and left a piece of
white paper stuck in the
door for us to see when we
returned. The message was
clear: ``Eggs!’’
Our neighbor took them
home where she and her
family enjoyed what I suspect
was some delicious
French toast. I had some
myself this morning and
can say without any sense
of false pride that homemade
bread soaked in fresh
organic eggs is about as
tasty as it gets.
Since starting this husbandry
project I have discovered,
as is the case with
just about everything, that
there are as many ways of
raising chickens as there
are chicken raisers. As my
close friends know I am not
one to gab much. At most
parties or social gatherings
I tend to hug the wall closest
to the either the darkest
wall or nearest escape
route.
I am not one to go out of
my way to ``make’’ idle conversation.
Oddly enough, I
find myself jumping at the
chance to engage friends
and neighbors in chicken
discussions in the oddest of
places.
For instance, I saw a
friend and neighbor at the
concert the other night and
leaped out of my seat to run
down the aisle to ask her
about her chickens. Are
they laying? Do you incarcerate
them for the winter
or do you let them out? How
do you keep their water
from freezing? Etc.? We
chatted a bit about tactics
and strategies and then she
said, with a slight hint of
bemused exasperation, that
she was in the market for
some intelligent chickens. I
suggested that there are no
chicken Rhodes scholars
and that chickens will be
chickens. Given my firm
adherence to evolutionary
theory, I suspect chickens
are about as intellectually
capable as they need be.
As I was leaving the gym
one morning I bumped into
another friend who has
been raising chickens for
quite some time. She had to
stand there in the cold, gym
bag in hand, while I queried
her about her cold
weather practices.
A wonderful and very
generous person, she offered
up the information
graciously. I settled into my
car and headed home feeling
a bit more comfortable
about my methods — and
my instincts.
This afternoon, weather
permitting, I will nail on
the siding to the winter entryway
to the hen house I
framed last week. I picked
up the lumber yesterday
and, lo and behold, the
neighbor from whom I
bought the rough hewn
lumber passed on some
chicken raising info he had
gleaned from his mother
who has raised them for
years.
The primary topic was
the necessity of plugging up
any openings that might allow
a draft to chill the girls
while enjoying their beauty
sleep.
My sheltie Gabby and
the chickens seem to be getting
on famously. The first
few days she barked and
they scattered. Now they
pay her no mind at all. Unfortunately,
she’s a bit too
enamored of their droppings
and will spend an inordinate
of time following
in their wake on the days
we let them out to free
range a bit.
The other day, while I
was working in one of the
gardens, Gabby was snoozing
in her favorite spot on
the hill while the chickens
pecked the ground around
her foraging for their protein
supplements. I wish
we could find ways of
achieving such peaceful intra-
species accommodations.
Columns
Hawthorn Hill: We’re experiencing chicken mania
- Columns
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From Fly Creek: Revving up for spring
Time to bring you up to date on Fly Creek’s happy clambering into Spring. First, the eatery scene. “Is Jerry’s open yet?” The answer is, “Oh, yes!” The porches are freshly stained; the lawns a uniform green, and the hop vines are already climbing the posts on the covered side deck. Blue and I went up there to lunch earlier this week, and I celebrated spring with my traditional bacon, onion and Swiss cheese hamburger. We two sat on the deck, enjoying the broad view and some spectacular clouds marching across, up toward Schuyler Lake.
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In These Otsego Hills: More from 1986 ...
This week we continue with the discussion of telephone service from the pre-dial days. On March 12 we noted that: “No one has yet produced a telephone directory from pre-dial days, but Doug Preston of New Hartford recalls that some business (which one?) in the village had the phone number 7.”
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Home Notes: Celebrations abound at the Thanksgiving Home
April was a month of celebrations and much to appreciate. We had a 90th birthday celebration for Wanda Noyes on April 4 including her family and friends. Personal care staff Dee Bouck worked with residents to hand paint Easter eggs for the tree in the activity room.
Continued ... -
In These Otsego Hills: 1986 continues ...
This week we continue our journey through the columns of 1986 with the answer to the question “for whom, according to tradition, was Hannah’s Hill named?”
Continued ... -
Book Notes: Baseball book features local contributors
Baseball is part of the nation’s fabric. Most kids have a memory of the game either from playing Little League, attending a major league contest or meeting a favorite player. In Cooperstown that feeling is magnified since we are the official home of baseball. We get to see firsthand what has made the sport the national pastime.
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From Fly Creek: Ya really wanna know?
SETTING: Fly Creek General Store. CAST: Assorted seated geezers, drinking coffee. [Door opens, enter heavy-set geezer; walking slowly with wide stance, maybe prostatitis.]
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In These Otsego Hills: Returning to 1986 ...
For the past several years now we have undertaken sharing some of the area’s oral history we have collected over the years that we have written this column. Therefore, this year, we would like to go back to 1986 to share that rather unusual year. Those who were here then no doubt remember that it was that year that the village celebrated the bicentennial of its founding.
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From Fly Creek: For reasons unknowable
[Jim’s reached back to 2002 to share one of his favorite columns.] My father was born as the last century began into a river village in tidewater Maryland. He told me once of a man there in his boyhood who, like so many, made a thin living tonging for oysters in the cold months and, in the hot and humid ones, crabbing and raising vegetables.
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In These Otsego Hills: CCS balancing act ... side two
Last week we shared a number of activities in which students at CCS can participate. We thought it was an impressive, if not overwhelming, list. And we are indeed pleased that the young people of our area have these opportunities. However, we think it is also important to keep in mind that these undertakings do have a cost associated with them. They are not free. In fact there are, no doubt, those who would say they do not come cheap.
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From Fly Creek: A graceful crowd
Make of this what you will, friends. I feel I’m really meant to share it with you. Despite good medication for my Parkinsonism, every four or five weeks I can sensethe symptoms building up on me, giving me more than ordinary trouble. Lately it’s been falls, and last week brought a typical one. I’d gone out to get the paper, moving along with penguin steps on the snowcoved ice patches, and usingmy spike-tipped cane the waya climber uses an ice axe. But circumstances overcame me. Parkinson’s wipes out the possibility of multi-tasking.
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In These Otsego Hills: This and that and the other side ...
We note that the CCS Class of 2012 is presenting its senior class play, “Snow White” by Tim Kelly, this week with performances 7:30 p.m Thursday and Friday, March 29 and 30, and at 11 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. Saturday, March 31. All performances will be at the Nicolas J. Sterling Auditorium at the Middle/High School.
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In These Otsego Hills: That green thing ...
Of late we have noticed that our email inbox has been much busier than usual. In fact, we find ourselves hard pressed to keep up with all the various messages we receive. As a result we suspect we have not answered some in as timely a fashion as might be thought appropriate.
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From Fly Creek: What you need to know
In their last Sunday’s bulletins, all 84 churches of Otsego County were to have carried announcements of an important meeting; most of them did. But because the announcement is so important, and not just to the churched, here it is again.
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Book Notes: Living the magic of ‘Hoosier’
A lot of people consider “Hoosiers” the best sports film of all time. The 1986 classic follows the exploits of a fictional small town Indiana high school basketball team in 1952 as it attempts to achieve the impossible dream of a state championship. The story is inspired by the true life achievement of the 1954 Milan team, who with an enrollment of only 161 students shocked big city power Muncie Central on a last second shot to win the state title. It’s the kind of sports story that represents something that is hard to grasp unless you live in a small town.
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In These Otsego Hills: The most perfect village... home to heavy industry?
We suspect we would get a whole lot more accomplished if we spent less time thinking, pondering and musing about things. In fact, there is a good possibility we might actually have completed our goal of cleaning the basement if we only focused on the task at hand, instead of trying to figure out the world around us. It almost makes us wonder if it is possible to think too much about things. We certainly hope not because should that be the case, we are in deep trouble.
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Up On Hawthorn Hill: The past in the present
Clichés abound about the value of photographs. Most are probably true at least to a certain extent. What I do know about an image is that it represents something of the past that is not the pastitself. But that is the power of any image. It represents something that once was. The beauty of an image, revisited, is that it functions as a catalystfor reliving in the present a past experience. My own view, one that I thank the Spanish writer Jorge Luis Borges for, is that all we ever can experience is the present.
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Home Notes: Workshops held for Thanksgiving Home residents
We welcomed Linda Keller, Ph.D. of the Bassett Research Institute and Ida Baker of NYCAMH who presented a six-week workshop for residents and staff.
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From Fly Creek: Late-winter hamlet news
Well, at least I’m “guessing” it’s late winter now — in the winter that wasn’t. But, if not snow, I can provide a flurry of Fly Creek news to share with you, scooping Associated Press, Reuter’s, and United Press International, not to mention all local news services except our General Store.
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In These Otsego Hills: Waiting for spring to have sprung ...
Difficult as it to believe, both January and February seem to have flown by and we find ourselves turning the calendar over to the month of March, which we have long thought is one of the more dreary months of the year. Of course, as in the pastthere are signs of spring as reflected by the tapping of the maple trees. For many years, the trees sprouted buckets to capture their all important sap. However, we now know to look for the sap collection lines that are strung from tree to tree.
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Book Notes: Kennedy: a unique individual
It’s been almost 50 years since the Kennedy assassination shocked the nation. Since then much has been written about President John F. Kennedy and whether he would have achieved his destiny (whatever that may have been) if he had lived. It is said he inspired young people in a way that has never been equaled. And there is the notion of Camelot, espoused by his widow Jackie, that there will never be a time of hope and promise like that again.
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From Fly Creek: Revving up for spring
