So now we have chickens

We’ve got three chickens and a rooster with one bum leg living at our house. They aren’t our chickens but the neighbor's. The chickens go home in the evening to roost, but that’s about it. The rest of the time they hang around our place.

I think the chickens would rather deal with our dog than their owner’s two labs. Brownie listens pretty well and knows better than to hurt the chickens. I’m pretty sure one of the labs is the reason the rooster hops on one leg. The neighbors are also doing a massive landscaping job with heavy equipment running all over the place. That scares the birds and they come running across the street to my place.

My lovely wife and I told the neighbors not to worry about their chickens. We don’t mind having them around. They are amusing to watch. They also eat a lot of bugs. The dog hasn’t come home with a single tick since the chickens have been on patrol.

My lovely wife always wanted to have chickens. The problem with that idea is that we also like to travel. It’s not like we could take a bunch of chickens on the road with us. One chicken, maybe. There is that guy who sailed around the world with his pet chicken. Now we can enjoy watching them without having to worry about them.

-Sixbears

Insulation trick

What do you do if you can’t afford to change your inefficient windows? Maybe you are in an apartment and are stuck with the heating bill. It’s a shame to have your precious heating dollars fly out single pane drafty windows.

The older part of my house has old fashioned single pane windows that lose a lot of heat. The cheap and easy solution was to cover most of the windows with several layers of bubble wrap. A local store had piles of the stuff to get rid of. They were happy someone was going to use it.

While it blocks your ability to see outside, it does let a lot of light in the house. Bubble wrap has surprisingly good insulation properties. It works well at stopping drafts too. A few windows were not covered so I could see outside. Of course, I chose the better windows for that. The bubble wrap got me through the winter.

Since them I salvaged some wooden framed windows from a construction project. After cleaning, painting and repair, they were turned into old fashioned type storm windows. They were slightly bigger than my house widows, so all I had to do was screw them on the outside of the house. Of course, they have caulking and gasket material for tight seals. Unlike the bubble wrap, I can see out of them.

Two of my tall narrow “storm windows” are repurposed glass doors from a store cooler. Every few years the cooler doors are changed and just thrown away. A friend of mine salvaged enough of them to solar heat his chicken coop. The chickens loved it.

-Sixbears

Free Range Human

City life is more energy efficient than country life. Sadly, this to a large extent is true.

A city does a lot of things. Much of what a person needs in daily life is within walking distance. If too far to walk, then a short metro or a city bus ride will get you to what you need. Out in the country, everything is far away. In the city, a car is unnecessary. In the country, it's almost unthinkable not to have one. In fact, most people will have more than one.

Housing people is more efficient in the city. City apartments do more with less square footage. They don't need the same space. No need for a garage if you have no car. No need for a big pantry if you walk past the market and dozens of restaurants every day. Heck, no need for a kitchen if all your meals are in restaurants or take out.

Apartment buildings tend to be more efficient than individual houses. It's simple geometry. Heat is lost from outside walls. A stand alone house can lose heat in all directions. In an apartment building, most of your walls are shared with other apartments, not the outside.

So cities are more efficient. Why don't I live in one?

Chickens.

What's the most efficient way to raise chickens? Huge factory warehouses. Like a city, they have tremendous efficiencies of scale. Chickens take up very little space individually, as they are really packed in under one big roof. It's easy to feed them in conveyor like fashion. Food in, wastes out, huge production -just like a city.

Free range country chickens are different birds entirely. They see the light of day. Much of their feed is not standardized. Much of their diet comes from weeds and bugs they scratch up themselves. They run around loose, doing whatever they want.

The factory chickens all have exactly the same experiences in life. Everything is controlled and regimented. Free range chickens develop individual personalities because their lives have variety. They live closer to a wild state than their factory farmed cousins.

I like to think of myself as a free range human. Not quite wild, as there are still societal cages around me, but it's a lot easier to jump the fence.

If you live in a city, that's fine, if that's what you like. However, ask yourself; are you a factory farmed domesticated animal?

-Sixbears