Eggs Revisited

That's a revoltin' thought . . .

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Roswell, chickens won't wander off because they are roosting birds, and will return to their roost each evening.

The archaeological evidence is that the Chinese domesticated chickens. Ten thousand years of keeping chickens, and they still haven't learned how to properly cut up the carcass.

Our family got over decades eggs from the same farm - most certainly, the hens changed, though.
They tasted differently over the year, depending what they got for feed.

Since a couple of years, I only buy organic eggs - which taste as good but all over the year.

(I've noticed that US 'large' eggs are the EU's M-class, while our L-class is even larger than your 'jumbo' - and we've even got a XL-class ...)

Large eggs are way smaller than they used to be, even by N. American standards.

Source

each breed puts out a different egg weight and size on average. We have Wyandottes which are NOT good market eggchickens (as are neither Aracaunas and Polish) We like em for the egg size and the temperment of the chicken. SInce we let em roam free in the pastures, they follow the herd of sheep all day and blend right in. SOmetimes we can see a cghicken perched on top of a sheeps back like a MAhout.

That's the name of the dominant Amerindian ethnic group in the southern part of South America (Chile and Argentina, primarily). Those birds come from South America?

We own 57 acres and rent an additional 150. The chickens , once they get patterned to stay around will only follow the sheep. The sheep are behind electric fences and the chickens love the sheep company.
We had guinea hens once and they just ran waay far and ranged to the next farms. Several were killed by farm dogs. In this months ATLANTIC MONTHLY, Mark Bowden tells his story of thedeath wish that guinea hens have. Marks wife, GAil, wanted these guinea hens and they went out and bought 30, I believe. She also had a really neat pen and roost for the birds. Thatwas like April when the poults came and they started the guinea experiment. Today, I was talking with him and he said that theyre down to 4 guinea hens.

My theory is that the only defensive weapons that many flock birds of the gallinaceous family are:

1A herding instinct and

2A great fecundity

So, when attacked by peredators the guineas adopt that defense mechanism that protects most campers from grizzlies, that being:

"I dont have to run faster than the bear, I only have to run faster than you"

Chickens are pretty much a home territory bird and they arent really good flyers. They can only fly up to a branch or make a purt of 25 feet or less. Guniea hens can take off like a pheasant and then coats over several tens of acres.

FOXES love guinea hens, they have a great flavor.

Araucanas were developed in Chile supposwedly by the Araucan pweople. The chicken has Sideburns like Gen Burnside and they lay colored eggs, usually blue , but also green pink, and ornage. Its a function of the feed mix.
Araucanas are really people chickens. Theysee you in the yard and they come over and do their chirruping . They are great chickens if you have pets or kids. They are friendly but wont let you manhandle them. Ive seen one chase our dogs. They can keep that up for hours.
There is an AMeriauracana, which doesnt have the Burnsides and has a rumpless tail cause of US chicken conformity rules. (Its all bullshit anyway)

The guy down the street has guinea hens. They seem to range farther and farther from his home as the years go by. But he still has the same number of them.

My dog loves to bark at them as we drive by

Theyve just been fortunate that there are probably no big meat eater predators near you. You do have lynx and bear No?
I cant account ofr why an individual flock survives. Around here we have fox and they have a field day with dumb guineas (Thats the big thing, these birds are really stupid). Fox will stay away from a rooster even though they could "take the rooster" the fox would probably get hurt somewaht and they are economical about suffering injuries. The really big kick-ass birds are geese. A big canada or barnyard drake will kick the **** out of a fox so the fox usually leave em alone unless they have an opportunity with one thats sick or hurt.

We've definitely got black bears because one of them ate my bird feeder, and many of my neighbors have taken pictures of them. And we've got Grey Foxes. But I've never seen a Lynx or a Bobcat. We've also got Fisher Cats, but I think they are primarily squirrel hunters (they also eat domestic cats, because every year when the Fisher's are around, lost cat posters pop up everywhere).