All your pets!

I have many pets, as Kayleigh knows! I have six cats, Paul, Luigie, Sparta, Princess Stripes, Brave and Trudie. My dogs are Dafi, Peggy, Skyler, and Puppy. My bunny is Flower. I used to have three other cats, Dark Night, who died young, Trixie and Socks, who ran away. I used to have three snails too, Gary, Gary II, and Garetta. I love my pets and they are all very spoiled! They get Christmas prestents and birthday prestents, weddings, and birthday parties! They have two BIG triangular houses and a rectangular cat food shelter!
Well, please tell about your pets too!
Jordyn

Just a few minutes ago, i brought Sparta inside for about 10 minutes. I put him by his grandma Trudie, and he sat down by her and she gave him a bath!!! She loves him, and he loves her. i am going to take him in and out more often.
Jordyn

Well, my family has quite a few pets, too.

First, we have two very spoilt cats, Patch and Caspian, who are about 12 years old and are brothers. Patch is 'mine' and Caspian is my sister's, althoguh they belong to the entire family really.

We also have a whole lot of chickens. I'm not sure how many, between 10 and 15. We're going to get (lots) more after summer is over, so we can sell the eggs. Four of our chickens we got as chicks earlier this year and are very friendly - you can go in and sit down and they'll come and sit on your lap.

My sister has 7 rabbits. When we moved 18 months ago, there were 3, and within the space of about 2 months we had 4 litters of rabbits. I don't know much about the rabbits because they're my sister's.

I have 2 quails which I bought with my own money. So far I have about 25 eggs which are currently being sat on by one of our broody chickens. I'm hoping that being sat on by a chicken will be good enough, since the quails don't seem interested, and I want to sell the babies once they're big enough.

My family will also probably be getting an alpaca baby (called a 'cría') and a lamb sometime next year. I'm very exciting about this.

That's all the pets we have, unless you count the yabbies in the pond.

From Rachel.

My uncle has 6 sheep, and one lamb. their names are Pipen, Codle, Cindy Lue Ewe, Sandwitch, Lambie, and Mary Kate. Funny names right? He has two roosters, Berry and Al Sharpten. He used to have one named Lord Oliver Cromwell. His quails are names Dan, Dan as well, Dan 3, Dan 4, Dan 5, and Dan 7. They lost Dan 6. Then he has two french mastifs, Bow and Matilda. Then a 13 year old cat named Ebby. He is planning on getting rabbits, meat rabbits, and a horse. They are building on to their home, making it 4 rooms bigger. They used to have a really small living space. With 5 people in the home, they had 4 rooms. A living room, a master bed room, a little tiny bed room for the three boys, and a small kitchen. Now they will have two more bedrooms, a sitting room, and i think a bigger kitchen, but i'm not sure what the other room is going to be.
Jordyn

Well, we have six white chickens, called Vegemite, Treacle, Honey, Maple Syrup, Feet, and Other White Hen. Vegemite actually has a smear on her head which looks like someone's rubbed vegemite on her, and Feet was abused by her last owners and has had her toes cut off, so her feet are basically stumps. We've got two grey bantams called Little Hen and Grey, and a blind brown silky called Bottomless Pit (she eats... and eats... and eats... and eats... and eats...). We also have two brown hens called Brown Hen One and Brown Hen Two, and a black one called Black Hen. I know, inventive names. My father named the Brown Hens, Grey, Black Hen, and Feet. I named Bottomless Pit and Vegemite.

My sister's rabbits all have names but I'm not entirely certain what they all are! There's a black one with a white nose called Midnight, and a sort of grey mottley one called Smudge, and an evil white one with red eyes called Sugar. The 'babies' we have left are from one of Sugar's litters (Smudge is the father), and there are two white males called Twitch and Sniff (I named them when they were big enough to hold 5 in my hand at once, they were pink and all they seemed to do was twitch and sniff) but my sister renamed them General Flopsy and General Mopsy. There are two grey-brown females called Reepicheep and Excalibur (my mother named Reepicheep and I named Excalibur. When they were babies, they looked like mice).

My male quail is called Quincy, and I haven't decided on a name for the female. If you think of a girl's name beginning with 'Q' (for 'quail'), let me know!

Oh, and I used to know two chickens (they belonged to our neighbours at our old house) who were called Shishkebab and Kentucky Fried.

Just out of curiosity, are all of your uncle's quails male?

Rachel.

No, they are not all male. But i think he has 3 males, but i will check with him to double check.I know some girl names that start with Q.
Quin
Quinah
Quinita

Well hope those are some helpfull names!
Jordyn

I know a lot of boy names starting with Q. Well, some. I know that George's father from the Famous Five Books was Quentin. Perhaps I'll just keep calling her 'Mrs Quail'.

from Rachel.

So, is keeping chickens hard, or is it easy? I have always wanted chickens, but my daddy says he doesn't because they stink and they go every where. I would take care of them, but i don't know how. Do the eggs taist any diffrent then store bought? My momma says they do, and I am not saying she is wrong, but I would like someone elses opinon. thanks!
Jordyn

Keeping chickens is fairly easy, I think; but we've had chickens since I was about two or three, so I can't really remember anything different. The getting everywhere thing is negated by keeping them in a coop or run. It's not exactly 'free-range', but our dozen or chickens live in a fairly large run, I don't know how big it is, maybe eight metres by six or more, so they're quite happy and they get tree cuttings and lawn clippings when there's some.

Apart from that, basically all you have to do with chickens is feed them once or twice a day (we give them food scraps in the morning and grain at night) and collect the eggs (we check the nesting box when we feed them). Most chickens will lay in a nesting box if there's one, which is usually a pretty small space not much larger than the chicken itself, with an entrance and lined with straw. But chickens also give a place to do something useful with food scraps; soft food scraps are good, softly bits from fruit, but they can't eat hard things like orange peel or watermelon rind. We also bake and grind up eggshells which makes the shells better; that way you don't need to buy grit blocks for them.

Oh, and as for the smell, I can think of some much smellier animals!!! Chickens don't care where they poop, but if they've got grass or straw on the ground you won't notice it. They're generally pretty clean animals and with actually bathe themselves regularly!

As for the eggs, home chicken eggs *definately* taste better!! The taste stronger I guess. The yolk is also a slightly different colour. I've only rarely eaten shop-bought eggs since we got chickens, but I haven't really enjoyed those experiences. I don't mind eggs, normally; they're not my favourite but I don't hate them. But when I'm out and eat egg in a salad or something, I can tell if it's shop-bought just from tasting it, although sometimes the colour is noticable, too. Oh, and home-grown eggs are also larger.

Anyway, I would definately recommend getting chickens, although I guess it's up to your father. You can get point-of-lay pullets which will begin laying for you almost immediately, but often aren't very friendly (they're not evil or anything, but you can't go in and pat them). Alternatively, you could get chicks and hand-raise them, although that's a bit of work and requires things like a warm lamp, a cage which can be indoors, and chick formula. Also it stinks up whatever room they're in, so your father probably wouldn't like it!

But if you get point-of-lay pullets, there are a couple of things you need first; a small 'coop' or cubby house type thing with three or four walls and a roof, in or attached to a reasonably large 'run' or 'pen' which the chickens can get to easily. And put some 'perches' inside; all you need is a stick about 3/4 of an inch in diameter which can rest about a foot off the ground. You need a water hopper to put in the run. You'll also need to purchase grain or pellets to supplement their diet, depending on what sort of scraps you feed them (I've seen some families feed their chickens just scraps and they've been fine, particularly if that family eats a lot of rice or grains, but I'd recommend having grain or pellets). If you've got all that, just put the chickens in and remember to feed them at least once a day and collect the eggs!

I hope this helps,
from Rachel.

Also, don't use egg birds for food. The chickens used for food are a completely different breed. Eggs birds are dry and stringy, especially if they've lived a long, healthy life laying eggs. Get some meat birds if you want to eat them (thus far this has not occured for us).

I don't know if i told everyone, but Sparta was killed in about Febuary. He was 8 months old. He was run over, like Dark Night.
Jordyn