WELCOME to HAPPY TO BE...This is a blog about my love of Antiques, My family, humor, as humor keeps us laughing and my every Day life...I hope you enjoy your visit...Please leave me a comment to let me know you Came by so I can visit with you Thank You !!...Hugs and Smiles, Gl♥ria

October 2, 2010

~For The Birds~

Today I wanted to join my Sweet Sis Chari at "Happy To Design " for repost Sunday...Please be sure and go by and see all the GREAT Do overs today...This post I did in Jan 2009 Hope you enjoy!!
I thought today I would share with you my Bird farm...Yes from 1991 to 2007 I use to raise birds.... From BIG birds to little birds...see these Eggs ??? Well the Big one is an Ostrich egg, the green one is an Emu egg and in the front row is a Bob White quail egg, and of course a Chicken egg.. we also use to raise Peacocks and Guinea hens... Now I am sorry about these pictures but they are just snap shots that I had to scan..this is my sweet little Mama with a just hatched Emu chick, these are Emu chicks in the brooder box under the heat light and here is an Emu chick at a week old in its chick run...

Now this is an Ostrich male at 6 months old and the 2 birds next to him our an Emu pair at 6 months old... Ostriches can reached heights of 10 foot...where Emus will get to 8 foot..now these are still babies birds... these are just pictures of me in the pens with the birds so you can really see how big they can get.Now Ostriches come from Africa and they are the largest bird in the world...but they can not fly..thank God for that, I sure wouldn't want to clean my wind shield after they flew over... Emu's come from Australia and are the second largest bird.. Ostriches lay there eggs during the summer months and Emus during the winter months..so we were always busy with incubating eggs..and with Emus the male sits on the eggs to hatch them and the female will only lays as many eggs as what he will sit on..if she lays to many he will kick them out from under neath him...And Emus will only drop there eggs at night time...and our would lay one every 3 nights.... The female Emus will have nothing to do with her eggs she'll lay them, and get up and leave them for the male...and the Male when he is sitting will go for 56 days without food or water while he hatches them.. Now the male Ostrich will get very mean while he is in color...his neck will turn bright Red..and he really don't want anyone near him at that time...I mean come on he is servicing his women !!!




Now this is what we called our grow out pens....now every chick we had we did blood work on for DNA sexing and Microchip ed each one in the piping muscle in their necks...As when we got ready to sell them we know they were unrelated pair...we would sell week ago chicks to one year old birds... the older they were the more they costed...Yearly Ostriches were selling for $42,000. a pair.... Emus were $18,000. a pair....




Now this is a male and female Ostrich both at 3 months old...you can really see how gray and little she is to the male who is the Pretty one...he is just coming into his black and white color..the other picture is of them full grown Yearlings..
Hope you enjoyed my little bird farm today...it was really fun when we did this...but was too hard on me to keep it up after my late husband died...those 50 lbs feed sacks got to be too heavy for me...at one time we had over 300 Ostriches and Emus here...and girls I will tell you one Ostrich egg will made an omelet for 10 people...where as it takes 5 quail eggs to equal one chicken egg and yes I did use the eggs for baking...only if they were not fertile and we also sold the by product from the birds...the Ostrich's eggs we sold for $50.00 and Emus eggs for $25,00.


We also would have the Emu's bucthered ...The fat from the Emus was rendered and sold to burn clinics...nothing on those birds was a waste...And the Leather from the Ostriches was also another by-product we sold...after we send it to the tannery...


Until next time from my mountain to yours


hugs and smiles Gl♥ria

16 comments:

Chari at Happy To Design said...

Hi Sis...

I was just sitting here at the computer when I seen your post pop up! I'm so glad that you joined in with Sunday Favorites, Sis...what a treat! Thank you!!!Girl, I can't even begin to imagine the hours and work that it took to keep up with your bird farm! They really are fabulous creatures though...aren't they! You know, the autistic young man that I took care of at school...his family had a couple of emus. I was always so intriqued by them! They also had peacocks and guinias. Anyway, I loved getting to see all of your photos and loved reading all about these fabulous creatures! Isn't that something about the male emu sitting on the eggs...and going without food and water for that long! I also just adored getting to see the photo of your sweet mama! Sis, you look just like her! Beautiful women!!!

Was going to ask...did you have someone carve the emu egg in the first photo? Or is is painted? It's gorgeous!

Well Sis...so happy to see you today! What have you been up to this weekend? We have just been lazying around! Hehe! I need to get busy and vacuum! YUK! I'd much rather sit at the computer! wink!

Love ya, Sis!
Chari

Madeline's Album said...

This was a very interesting post. I really did learn alot. Enjoyed the photos. Have a blessed day. Madeline

Sherry @ No Minimalist Here said...

Gloria, The photos of the chics are so cute! Raising them sounds like a lot of work. I am shocked at the cost to purchase a emu or ostrich. Wow.

I would love for you to stop by and enter my giveaway if you haven't already done so. Take care.
Hugs, Sherry

Kathy said...

I really enjoyed reading your post I never knew the ostrich was from Africa. -It sounds like such a wonderful life -one that I'm sure many would envy-until we had to actually work that hard for a few days. :-) The little baby birds sure are cute

Gypsy Heart said...

Interesting! Sending love your way my friend...I've missed you. The vertigo & sinus stuff kept me so limited but feel wonderful today! I am so grateful too ~

xoxo
Pat

Keetha Broyles said...

So glad you reposted this! How fun to incubate and hatch all those eggs!!! Love the BIG BIRDS.

They have Sand Hill Cranes in Wisconsin, when I see them beside the road they look sooooo large I call them "The Wisconsin Emus."

Lori E said...

This was so interesting. I had no idea. I bet you had to do a lot of research before getting involved in this.
A just how does one decide to get involved in this?

Chari at Happy To Design said...

Mornin' Sis...

Just read your note! Ohhh noooo...I hope whoever hit the electric pole...knocking out your electricity...is okay? Hehe...sounds like you and Lenny had fun...sitting in your sunroom with lanterns for light! I love it! What are you guys up to today?

Love ya, Sis!
Chari

Carole Burant said...

Well for goodness sakes, this is the first time I've known someone who raised Emus and Ostriches!!! How awesome! I can well imagine the work that was involved, being that they're such big birds. I loved seeing all of your photos and can tell that they were well taken care of. No doubt you were sad to have to stop raising them but you certainly couldn't continue doing so on your own. What fun memories though:-) xoxo

Kranky Granny said...

Gloria, thanks for the visit to my green eyed monster post. It lead me to your wonderful repost on your bird farm. I certainly learned a lot from reading it. I had no idea that those birds could be so valuable.

But, I grew up in the country and had a neighbor that had a turkey farm so I understood the work involved. Plus, we raised our own chickens, rabbits and hogs and nothing ever went to waste there either.

Sissie's Shabby Cottage said...

Wow Gloria, this is absolutely fascinating. I never knew this about these birds, especially the part about the male sitting on the eggs! LOL!

thanks for sharing this part of your life.

hugs
Sissie

Vanessa said...

Hi! Thanks so much for stopping by my blog and leaving such a sweet comment! What a fun post this is and I was thinking about how my kiddos would have loved to visit your birds and especially see those sweet babies! Looking forward to seeing more of you here in blogland!
Vanessa

Dawn said...

You amaze me! Is there anything you haven't done?

I want to make sure you got my email about the blog party in Escalon being postponed till spring!
I posted on it too. I'm bummed but sometimes no matter how well you plan something comes up.
Hugs,
Dawn

Gloria said...

Wow, this is amazing! Who knew you would have done this for a living?! What an interesting life you have led. I love the baby birds, but when they all got big, I don't know if I'd love them that much! And the work this must have entailed - I can't even imagine. Well, thank you for sharing. It was very educating and informative! :)
Best,
Gloria

xinex said...

Wow! This is the first time I saw your birds, Gloria. I am glad you reposted them. You really did have so many birds. And those eggs do look familiar, lol!...Christine

Room Service ~ Decorating 101 said...

G. I know you have to be the most interesting person I know... when I die I want to come back and live your life. I loved this post!!!!! Thanks and also thanks for the sweet note about my little tater, he came from a long line of beauty...lol