Welcome to my Diary
Ruminations, Occasional thoughts & happenings - as they arise
To go to an entry click on one of the file names below - arranged in date order - the first item being the most recent. email me if you wish to be added to or removed from my Family & Friends emailing list.
[ Home ] [ Up ] [ Celebration ] [ Alliance ] [ On The Way home ... ] [ hens ] [ troglodyte ] [ communion ] [ BACK AGAIN ] [ WOLVES ] [ Days Like This ] [ Crab apple jelly ] [ ardglass BBQ ] [ Family South ] [ Athletic Hope ] [ Technical Communication - VHS to PC ] [ Email from Sister Anne ] [ Recent Communications ] [ Sharon ] [ renovation ] [ Dundee ] [ Yahoo! Scam ] [ The Crucifixion ] [ Chinese New Year ] [ Christmas Card 2003 ] [ BT & Broadband ] [ Conception & Birth ] [ Me 'n Cardinal Arinze ] [ gerryanderson ] [ speakin'norn'irelan' ] [ Cartoon Visitor ] [ Back to Future ] [ Thing of Beauty ] [ Happy Event ] [ Lifting My Soul ] [ Poor Old Church ] [ Homosexual Union? ] [ homophobic ] [ Sister-in-Law's Brain & Son's Visit ] [ Intensive care Party ] [ Smoking Seriously ] [ Singing Horses & Dying for Drugs ] [ Good Friday Meditation ] [ Iraq & Saddam ] [ Faith Guardians ] [ Unmetered telephone Access ] [ Canaries Holiday ] [ Domain Purchase ] [ Family Tragedy ] [ New Castlewellan School ] [ New Web design ] [ Amazing ] [ CV George Bush ] [ 2nd June ] [ DIY Death ] [ two letters ] [ The Rising ] [ Oisin ] [ Pete ] [ Transport of Joy ] [ Life Like a Mayonnaise jar? ] [ Brother gerry ] [ Austin ] [ Children on Love ] [ Mushrooms ] [ Maya's 5th Birthday ] [ more visitors ] [ Summer's end? ] [ Summer Goes On ] [ Summer ART ] [ Summertime ] [ Anthony Kerr ] [ a death or two ] [ I weep in my heart ] [ Conor's First Fag ] [ Tobacco Toleration ] [ Belfast International Airport ] [ Christmas ] [ A Great Time of the Year ]
Hens 26 June 2009
At the foot of my garden this fine June day four red hens scratch and lay
eggs - 4 each day, regular as clockwork. I got them ten days ago from a Donegal
lad working on a farm a couple of miles outside Downpatrtick, six or seven miles
from Ardglass.
"How much is that?" I asked as he stuffed them into
a large cardboard box I had brought for the occasion.
"Let me see," says he. "Three pound apiece!
£10."
"OK," says I, and handed over a ten pound note, and
then, for arithmetic is not my strong point, and I'm growing slow. "Wait!
four X three equals twelve!"
"Ah shure, a tenner is near enough," he says.
"Are you sure?" says I.
"Certain." he says.
"Ah, yer a dacent man from Donegal!"
So we closed down the boot of the car and I asked,
"What's this about grit they are supposed to have?"
"Grit. It's only sand. Do you want a bucket or
two?"
And when I nodded he filled another box I had from a big sack
of what looked like grey shore sand, and refused to take any money for it.
"By God, y'are a decent man from
Donegal!"
I swear he blushed as he smiled, "Ah shure what are we
in this world for?"
What indeed? And now my four happy hens are at the bottom
of the garden
(unless I let them out for a run through the whole garden now and again,
see below). 
Hens may have limited intellectual ability but I have feeling these ladies are
politely ignoring the industrial type security fencing that encloses them in a
22 x 11 feet hen run - which could house a dozen or more hens. I may work
towards this as time passes - and please God the industrial security fence will
gradually be covered with Virginia creeper and rambling roses, as well as three
small fruit trees I planted - all strategically placed so they will not cover
the lower reaches of the fence, as I like to look from my kitchen, or a garden
lounger, and see these wonderful creatures. Wonderful they are! Amiable
and clucking away, and retiring to the chicken coop* when they feel like laying
an egg - an absolutely amazing process! How do they do it, produce inside
their bodies such perfectly designed oval shapes filled with great food? I
don't know! Scientists may be able to describe the process but I am damned sure
they do not fully understand it! (Let me know when you hear of a
microbiologist who has created a chicken from scratch!)
| I'm not going into full production, but I must have a way of transporting eggs to family & friends - ergo my first, primitive egg box design. I am not as gifted as chickens when it comes to creating packaging. |
| The hens that I have are very
ordinary brown chickens. They each lay up to 300 eggs per year, for
about four years - and then they die (I am told) from sheer
exhaustion no doubt! I intend to get a couple of Sussex hens, like the one below - a big, bosomy lady who tends to lay fewer eggs but lasts for more years ..... I hear...... They cost about four times as much as the ones I have......  |
See how carefully I look after my new flock! (Conor came upon me as I rested my eyes in the shade of the garden umbrella following Sunday lunch in the Ardglass Golf Club. Thanks be to God I did not have my mouth open! ) 
|
* The chicken coop was made by a local woodworker. Cost £150, which is really cheap in 2008 / 2009. The T&G wood over the egg collection box was not such a good idea. It let in rain , so I had to cover with hardwearing pvc roofing felt (with a flap down from the coop side covering the hinges.)
Eggs of pastured [back garden] chickens contain
- 34% less cholesterol,
- 10% less fat,
- 40% more vitamin A,
- twice as much omega-6 fatty acid,
- and four times as much omega-3 fatty acid as the USDA standard (Source: Wikipedia)