CoOp Mini-Meeting Minutes

Hi All!

Peggy, Frank, Wendy and I all got together on Monday with the idea of reintroducing Esmeralda to the flock. Turned out not to be the best day weather-wise, so we instead had a brief discussion regarding CoOp policies. We all recognize that the CoOp members have varying levels of availability throughout the year and have limits to resources (time, money, expertise, etc) that they can contribute. With that in mind, we came up with a short list of the minimum requirements that we feel necessary for participation. They are as follows:

1. Weekly involvement of some kind. This can be anything from gathering eggs or giving the girls some "treats" (bread, table scraps, etc), to simply checking feed and water levels. This will serve not only to lighten the load on Peggy and Jeanne (albeit very slightly), but will also help CoOp members stay "in touch" with all the happenings and needs.
2. Coop Cleaning. All members will be expected to clean the coop twice a month. This is becoming more critical as the girls spend increased amounts of time indoors in the cold weather. There is a fair bit of flexibility available in scheduling this to allow for CoOp member's existing obligations.
3. Financial Contributions. At this point we are generating enough income through egg sales to cover the cost of feed. There are additional expenses in the form of bedding etc that will need to be covered, and there will be ongoing expenses for maintenance and improvements to the coop and pens. CoOp members will be expected to contribute to these costs either by cash out-of-pocket or by selling a portion of their share of the eggs.

In exchange for the items listed above, CoOp members will be entitled to receive two dozen eggs per week (assuming egg production stays at current levels or increases) which they can either consume or sell to help with the operating costs. Any surplus eggs will be sold and the money used for the CoOp.

 

These are the ideas that we came up with that seemed fair and we are hoping for input from the rest of the CoOp members. If anyone feels that these expectations are not reasonable, please let us know your thoughts and what you feel is fair. If you feel that you are unable or unwilling to participate any longer, please don't just walk away without letting us know why and if you feel that you have to date gotten as much out of the CoOp as you put in to it.

 

Again, I would encourage everyone to take a moment to think about why they became involved in the CoOp in the first place. If you add up the hours and expense of this venture it makes very little financial sense compared to simply purchasing eggs from another source. But as far as I'm concerned, finances aren't the point. I personally wanted to be involved for humane and environmental reasons. I like the idea that my eggs are coming from animals that are well cared for and are allowed to live in a somewhat more "natural" fashion. I also like the idea that the eggs go "from the bird to my table" instead of being loaded into a styrofoam container, packed onto a diesel truck, transported to a warehouse, loaded onto yet another truck then driven miles and miles to a store where they will sit in an inefficient, open cooler. It's also reassuring to know the the chickens that produced the eggs aren't loaded with hormones or other drugs. There is also much to be said for the community-building aspect of a CoOp as well.

 

Thanks,

Matt

Chicken Co-op News

There are always new things to learn here. Today was one of those days. A beautiful sunny day, so we decided it was time to try putting Esmeralda back with the flock. We thought we would sneak her in while the rest were out playing in the compost bins and gobbling up the bread and scratch we threw out. They might not have noticed her, except that we put the Vicks on her would first. It had worked when we had a baby chick that was being pecked. They left her alone. It is not clear that it is a good idea with adult birds. It seemed to be going well. A few pecked at her but were turned away. Wendy and Matt and I were there to protect her if need be. Seemed to be going well. she went in and out of the coop with the rest, flew to the compost bin, blended in. We spent a little time getting one of the barred rocks off the pen top. she had flown up there but seemed to have no clue that she couldn't just go through the holes to get back into the pen where the bread was. Wendy literally shoveled her off finally. After Matt and Wendy left, I hung around to watch things. Esmeralda went under the ramp and proceeded to bury herself in the dirt. It looked like she was trying to rub off the Vicks with a dirt bath. However, a few of the other hens came at her in an unfriendly way while she was in the hole she had cleared. I sent one packing a few times, but it persisted. It seemed that she stuck out with the Vicks on and they didn't like it. She seemed to sense it needed to come off too. Since I also had to leave and could not be around this evening, I decided to put her back in the garage. She seemed almost relieved when I picked her up. So perhaps next time we should try it without the Vicks, to see if that turned out to be what bothered them. In every other way she looks and behaves just like the other Araucanas.

The other lesson is that we have to remember to re-set the timer when we have had a power outage. Yesterday the power was out for over two hours, so when I came home tonight at 9 the girls were still up playing because the light had not gone off yet. Always something new here.

 20 more eggs today. We need to let the friends know they need to call one of us when they want eggs, and we can telll them if they are available, so Jeanne and I don't have to spend alot of time on the phone contacting the many people who are interested in buying the extras.Then if it is your friend or contact you can deliver them or we can tell them how to find them. We don't want to be bothering people when they don't have a need, but I think we may be missing some friends who want eggs but are waiting for a call or a delivery. I'm not too anxious to get into the delivery business, but am willing to take them places if I am going to be near some of our customers anyway. For example, we work at BACN usually two days a week and can take some there to a few people who are on our list. I know some of the rest of you do the same with eggs you are selling. As long as production stays at this level, and coop members are either out of town or just not needing many eggs right now, we do have quite a few to sell. Let me know if you want me to take the extras to BACN. I think they will buy them from us for $2 a dozen, but I have not asked specifically yet. I wouldn't want to charge them any more than that. What do you think? I can also take some to several events on New Year's Eve day.

For the flock, Peggy

Religious freedom among chickens

The girls seem to have changed their minds (?) on when to take their sabbath. Every Sunday for the last month they have reduced their output to exactly 17, from the usual 20-21 a day. Not this week. They chose Saturday this week, putting out only 15, and today, Sunday they were up to 20 again. Have they switched to the Jewish sabbath? Are they responding to the approach of the full moon, which is a blue moon? Who knows. Esmeralda chose to lay her egg today in the very back of her box, where I finally looked near dark. I was wishing I were much younger as I wrestled it out of the box without falling on the poop she leaves on top of the box (her roost). The egg today is almost white, little blue in it. Did she give the blue to the moon? Neither of the other two Araucanas laid at all today. Clearly there has been a cosmic shift of some sort. Can't wait until tomorrow.

I think it is time to return Esmeralda to the flock. Since I have lots of time tomorrow and most of the next few days to watch things, and Wendy and Matt can be around also, as well as Frank, I think we can keep an eye on them to see what they do with her. We will need to send her in with some Vicks on her wound. Hopefully it will deter Pete as well as the pecking hens while she finds her place in the order of things again. The wound is right where Pete lands when he is jumping on the hens and doing his rooster thing, which has been the concern as far as returning her. She seems quite healthy and otherwise could have gone back some time ago.

The timer system in the coop seems to be working well. With the lamp going on over the water at 3 AM, the water is not freezing and the hens get a good start on laying. It means there are quite a few already by the time we get out there to let them out. I let them out of the pen for awhile today, but they got bored quickly. The good compost is now in a closed bin for the winter. So they returned to the pen on their own for some scratch, with no argument.

Peggy for the recovery room staff

Chicken Co-op News

Winter settles in at the coop. The temperature outside this morning was 5 degrees, inside the coop it was about 18. Needless to say the water was frozen again. Even with the heat light on it, we usually have to thaw it out a bit in the morning. Sometimes the water can has to come inside for a shot of hot water. Esmeralda's water is also usually frozen. The chickens are still anxious to get out of the coop and explore the small amount of ground they have under the porch roof, no matter how cold it is. We now have a timer on the heat light in the coop, which seems to be regulating their egg production somewhat. The light goes on at 5 PM, off at 8 PM, back on at 3 AM and off at 8 AM. By the time we get there in the morning to let them out, they have laid between 12 and 16 eggs already. Then they drop the rest throughout the day. Esmeralda lays her pretty blue egg every day in the afternoon. It takes some gymnastic skill to get into her hotel room to get the egg without falling into the temporary pen. Her wound is healing very well. Today she made a point of showing it to me. She turned that side to me, ruffled up her feathers and lifted her wing out of the way, so I got a good view. You can hardly see it now, and she may be ready to go back. She is putting on weight with all the private food and is quite perky. There is another Araucana who is losing lots of feathers on her tail end and showing too much bare skin for this weather. Not clear whether the others are picking her feathers off, or she is, or she is molting. Bad timing if it is the latter. She does not have a wound yet, but she may have to join Esmeralda in the garage for re-hab. We are keeping an eye on her.

There is definitely more attention needed to them in the winter if we are going to keep up the egg production and prevent boredom. We are still getting between 18 - 21 eggs a day, usually 20. The interesting thing is that every Sunday for the last month we have only gotten exactly 17. It's the only day we get that few. So we have 7 hens who think Sunday is a day of rest, which it used to be when I was young. Not a bad idea really. A day to pause from the frantic life we all seem to lead and just hang on to our eggs for a moment.

We are engaged in a self-examination process right now as a co-op. After the long summer of building coop and pens, feeding and nurturing them all and waiting for the eggs to start, and after two months of production, we are feeling a need to look at our various roles and needs, to determine a fair way to share the work and distribute the eggs. We are looking to make sure no one feels there is too much of an unequal level of participation in the daily work, or an unequal distribution of the products. We are also trying to make sure that feed and other things get paid for in a shared way. Selling extra eggs has been one way to try to cover expenses, but we are finding that a few people are putting up the money for the other little things we need, like timers, light bulbs, straw, grit, etc. Almost all of the initial expenses for the coop itself and the feed and supplies for the first five months were covered by Jeanne and Peg, with some help from Matt. Now it seems that the co-op part of the thing needs to function in the daily work as it did in the building phase, so we are trying to sort that out internally. We would welcome any advice from any others who have tried a co-op approach. How much work should members expect to do to support the operation? What is the best way to make sure we have the money to pay our way in the future? How do we determine how many eggs each family should get? Does it relate to what they put into it? Is there another way to decide? These are the questions we raise now and try to answer. For the moment there are enough eggs for each family to take two dozen a week and if they want to sell what they don't need they are putting the money into the egg jar and we are using it for food. Plus we have a few more dozen to sell as well, so we are currently breaking even on supplies, almost. We want to know how to operate when production goes down, which we assume will happen sometime. Since this is new for us, we expect it will take some time to work it all out so everyone feels good and the girls stay happy. Pete is still with us because no one has felt strongly enough about his removal to find a place for him to live or a pot for him to end in. He is mostly behaving himself, so he hasn't convinced me to end my ambivalence.

Jeanne is in Florida for five weeks, so it has been really good that Matt and Wendy show up every morning to help with chores and then return several times during the day. All visits are welcome. We have to collect eggs several times a day to keep them from freezing. Also we take bread and scratch to the girls several times to keep their energy levels up and keep them amused in their confinement. Once the sun gets around to the south I let them out of the pen. They like to sun themselves on the coop steps or perch on the compost bins to sun. Wonder how they will relate to the pending ice storm?

from Peggy

Chicken Co-op News

Yesterday the white hen, whose name is....(Sonia and Nadia just told me what it is last night, and it is already gone from the frontal neurons, begins with an E) went berzerk for about half an hour. She was pacing frantically back and forth under the roosts, hopping up and down on them, pecking at the sun-covered wall, pecking at the hens who were in the nest boxes. Really manic behavior. Wendy was there at the time also, and we could not figure out what was wrong with her. I let all the rest of them out of the gate and gave them some space to get away from her. They went right to the compost bins and forgot all about her. The stomach is always the first priority for them. We left her be, Matt came up and took a look, left, and when I came back from a walk she was acting perfectly normal. Not that we are finding anything perfectly normal with chickens. So the flock got to be outside on their own for a long time yesterday and it was warm enough that they puttered up and down the path and were ok. We are trying to put a timer on the lights now, so the heat light over the water goes off at about 8 PM and on at 3 AM. We are also thinking that it is almost time for Esmeralda to return to the flock. She is doing quite well and it seems the wound is healing over some. We are thinking we will put her back when the girls are out of the pen ranging, and she can just walk around with them as if she has always been there, only she will have a bunch of vicks vapo rub on her wound to prevent any pecking. Depending on weather, Monday afternoon might work. We will need to watch her re-entry and their reaction to her. I will be home until about 4:30 Monday, so will welcome company for them from anyone else after that as they make their way into the coop for the night. If we leave just the red light on as they are roosting, she should be ok, with the timer set so the other light over the water doesn't go on until 3 AM. Hope this makes sense to everyone.   Ernestine, that's it...nothing like a little computer work to stew up the brain.

Peggy for the Intensive Care Unit

Recycle Chicken

Hi all,

Was referred to a cool website by a friend yesterday - Recycle Chicken. Great resource for discovering where to recycle everything from cups to computers and more. Just type in what your would like to recycle and your zip code and you'll get a list of local facilities that accept the item. Check it out!

Matt

Chicken Coop News

Today was rather cold, and the issue of keeping the water from freezing came to the surface again. Esmeralda's water was frozen solid when Wendy & Matt arrived this morning, and in the coop there was slush around the edges of the water container when Keith arrived. Temperature was just on the edge last night in the coop, and it stayed ok until the chicken door was opened this morning and the cold air could rush in. By the time I got to it the thing was stuck and frozen and had to come inside to get thawed. So it seems that we need everyone to be vigilant when it is this cold. Having people drop by several times a day is what is keeping our girls (and Pete, who is still with us) happy. Thank you particularly to Matt & Wendy & Frank & Keith Jr, who are here every day to help, either with the girls or shoveling the walkway or pen. And thank you to Boots, who is going to her first doggie school tonight, but who is already very well-mannered and does a great job of snow plowing around the pen. To relieve boredom and prevent further attacks we are also giving them treats several times a day in the pen, like bread and lettuce and scratch. I let them out of the pen for about an hour this evening, for variety. They only go as far as the compost bins, where they stir up the ashes and other goodies.

A word of caution. The metal water can may seem to be unfrozen when in fact the water cannot get through to the outside because there is a rim of ice at the bottom. Take it inside the house, use the big sink in the kitchen and thaw it before opening and putting luke warm water in it. It doesn't hurt to sponge it off on both sides at the same time to avoid slime build up. Put random straw in the compost. I did buy new food and scratch today, getting us back to the better food from JK Feed. Hopefully this will improve the quality of their stools, which has been pretty poor lately, and give them whatever nutrients they may have missed with the other stuff. They just don't seem as fat and plush looking these days, now that bug season is over. They still gave us 20 eggs today. Nothing from Esmeralda. Everyone has recently taken eggs, so we are out for the moment. That will change tomorrow we assume.