Re: Big lessons for a healthy future

Hi Quentin and Oleg:

This post not CC'd by email
On Thu, 25 Oct 2007 08:58:49 -0600, Oleg Lego <rat@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:


Free range animals tend to have a higher proportion of omega-3
thanks to what they are eating. If most of there feed is wheat and
oats this wont be happening. It all depends on how often they fly the
coop and get bugs and vegetables from the garden.

Indeed. I live in a grain-producing area, and most folks around here
that keep chickens, if they don't allow them to range, feed wheat,
oats, barley, and so on. I feed a commercial mixture called "Eggmaker
18", which is an 18% protein pelletized feed, and we do let them
range. This results in eggs with bright orange yolks that are far more
tasty (and fresh) than the typical supermarket eggs. They also have
blue-green shells, but that's because they are Araucanas, and has
nothing to do with the nutritive value of the eggs.

I once order 100 mixed day old chicks more or less as an experiment.
The supplier threw in about 10 Cornish Rock crosses and I later learned
that they should not be raised with other chicks, i.e., some kind of
crazy appetite. I put some sand on the floor and the RC killed
themselves by eating the sand. It didn't bother the other chicks. Also a chicken hawk dove through my garage window trying to get to the chicks.

About half of the chicks were hens and half roosters. There were Rhode
Island Reds, white Leghorns, Araucanas, some black speckled variety. The
egg shells were white, brown, green, and aqua. The yolks were all bright
orange color because the chickens were range fed (bugs, clover, various
grasses plus corn mash. The black speckled chickens were hard to get
into the chicken house at night (roosted in trees) and the crows did
them in.

The chicken's psychology, especially of the roosters, reminded me a lot
of people. They definitely tried to establish pecking order. Humans are
usually more subtle, but not much.

It was more expensive to produce eggs than to buy them at the super
market. Eggs were close to 50 cents a dozen around 1947 and have
decreased in price in terms of inflation over the years.

Frank

.

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