It seems our girls want to celebrate Inbolc, or Candlemas, early this year, by a day. They are welcoming the increasing light and the longer days by finally increasing production after a little slump. We were down to 14-16 a day for a short time, but today they went to 21 again. A few are showing signs of wear on their backs near the tail and on their flanks. We suspect Pete is serving those more than the others. Some show no signs of a single misplaced feather (the Buffs and the Barred Rocks) while the Araucanas, the White Rock, a few of the Rhode Islands, a few Wyandottes, and Isa Brown are all looking kind of ratty. The Black Astrolorps are holding up well also. Pete has settled down some though, and does not seem to be on as much hormone overload as he was this fall. From what I am reading, he is behaving like a normal good rooster, dedicated to protecting his flock. He makes sure they eat first while he watches for preditors. He comes after us if we try to herd his girls or we are carrying something that looks like a weapon and keep it too high. The literature says, as does Matt's research, that we should hold him if he gets aggressive. He may not like it at first, but will settle down once he realizes we are at the actual top of the pecking order and don't plan to hurt him. Kicking and other aggressive actions on our part are counter-productive. They only make him think he has to fight us. It is only when we are stressing the hens in some way that he really gets aggressive. I think we should appreciate his fine rooster qualities. Once the girls are out free ranging this spring, we will most likely appreciate him even more. We do need to be aware that he will not respond well when we are trying to move the girls around or herding them into the coop, and particularly need to be on the watch for aggressive behavior when young Keith is with the flock, and Pete is likely to misunderstand his intentions. I am hoping to get a chance to try the holding thing soon, but he just doesn't seem to get mad at me much, so there has been no opportunity. They say he will sacrifice himself for the flock, signaling them to hide if a hawk is around, but leaving himself exposed until all are under cover. He has two warning calls, one for an overhead attack and one for a ground attack, so the girls know which way to run. From what I am hearing from others, our Pete is pretty well-behaved as far as roosters go, though it may not seem so if you are on the receiving end of a body slam. It helps to make sure you are standing upright as much as possible if you are doing something that might stress out the girls, so you look too big to mess with.
Related to this, I am reading about what happens to all those male chicks that no one wants from the hatcheries and it is not a pretty picture. It raises some really sticky ethical issues with regard to selecting a new batch. But it also reminds us that we will someday have to deal with the issue of culling or not culling the flock when we need to replace hens that no longer lay, how to do that, and when we might want to think about using some of our chickens as meat birds in the future. Or not. We chose heavy layers so they could serve as both, but I know I for one find I avoid the issue of actually butchering one of our chickens someday. At the same time, I know that a homestead way of living requires a diverse food supply that includes animals and plants in a conscious relationship with each other, for example as Joe Salatin does it. Since all of us seem to eat meat to varying degrees, we will have to look at how we face our food. I am personally feeling that I should take some responsibility for getting the food on my plate and not expect someone else to do the dirty work for me forever. I certainly welcome thoughts on this issue. The two hens which have died have been buried because we didn't know why they died, which got us off the hook to some extent.
Peggy, on the verge of Imbolc and the waning of the wolf moon.
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