Rescuing our baby chicken

We've just moved to a lifestyle block, owned by my husband's father, in Awahuri, New Zealand. There are chickens here and I have taken up the responsibility of feeding them, which feels pretty much like jumping into farming at the shallow end.

We have a couple of Khaki Campbell ducks, a guinea fowl, and about 9 Rhode Island Red chickens free ranging, and one of the hens was looking after four chicks when we got here. When we moved we brought two cats with us, so we thought it prudent to lock the brood in an old rabbit hutch that had been used as a chicken tractor for previous chicks by the owners of the property.

We recently had torrential rain from the tail end of tropical cyclone Wilma. Unfortunately a couple of the chicks managed to jump out of the nest box and did not know how to jump back in, so when I went to check on them I found two prone and lifeless looking bodies in the grass.

I picked them both up and one of them moved a leg so I bustled them inside and held them against my body for warmth. The bigger chick twitched his leg a bit and then expired, but the smaller chick started to open her beak and within an hour had warmed up, and fluffed up enough for me to return her to her mother.

Unfortunately, because I was too slack to fuss about in the rain, I didn't fix up a step for her so when I checked on her later the next day I found her in the rain, lying prone and limp in the grass again. She hadn't been there long though, as I had fed the chickens no more than half an hour earlier. I managed to warm her back up to conscious once more, and returned her to her mother, and added a brick to the box so she could jump back into the box. That was a learning experience.

All was well for about a week but one of her siblings mysteriously went missing and it became obvious that she was not being cared for by her mother. Her remaining sibling seemed to be getting all the food and she spent much of her time hiding in the grass or under the edge of the wooden frame, out of the nest box. She was so weak that even with the step I had added she could not climb into the box so I decided to bring her inside.

Since the warm wet weather we have had an abundance of flies now and she is enjoying feasting on them as I catch them for her. She is growing stronger by the day. It is still unclear whether she will make it to fully grown. Our oldest boy, Alexander, is loving having a cute baby chicken in the house. We have assumed that she is female but she hasn't actually been sexed so it may turn out that if we can get her to size, and she is a "he", then he will end up on the dinner table. This may be one of those traumatic growth experiences that small children endure. Only time will tell.

I have a friend in Feilding who has recently acquired an incubator and she is keen to go halves on any chickens if I can collect a clutch of eggs. I've been told that there is every likelihood that all the eggs the chooks are laying are fertile but currently we have one hen with three chicks, another with one (and the one I have inside), one who is laying flimsy shelled eggs in the nest box in the hen house and then standing on them and smashing them *sigh*, and one hen who has the rooster watch over her while she lays her eggs in a depression in the ground next to a corrugated iron fence... which is hardly a great place to sit on them.

Today Captain got a bunch of books from the library on keeping ducks and chickens. We are learning as we go!

Good news from Meridian Energy

I submitted an enquiry to Meridian energy about how difficult it is to connect a small wind turbine to the local energy network and how much it's likely to cost.

"Thank you for contacting Meridian Energy about self generation.

Meridian does purchase electricity produced from customers with small scale self generation equipment. The price we pay for the electricity you generate is the same as the price we currently charge you for your consumption, but this is subject to change just like all our rates.

The first step is to contact your local Electricity Lines company to get the details of what standards and specifications your equipment must meet in order to be connected to the local electricity network. Once you have obtained your compliant equipment, you will need Network approval from your local Lines Company to connect it to their network. Once this is obtained and you are a Meridian customer, we can arrange the metering for you.

A new Import/Export meter is required to be installed as it is not compliant with industry regulations for a meter to spin backwards. The Import/Export meter will separately measure all electricity consumed from the network and the electricity you export from your installed generation equipment.

Right House, a subsidiary company of Meridian Energy, can help with all aspects of distributed generation including as little or as much assistance as you need with generation, insulation, property design, hot water set up, lighting and heating and much more. They can even assist with the consents process (for Wind Turbines in particular) if necessary.

If you need further assistance, please feel free to email us at service@meridianenergy.co.nz or call our Contact Centre on 0800 496 496, 7.30am to 7.30pm Monday to Friday (Excluding public Holidays)

Kind Regards
{name removed}
Energy Advisor
Meridian Energy Centre"

Getting Long-Term

So Captain hasn't had a chance to relocate his career yet, but he's still got his feelers out for opportunities. We have had a bit of time to wrap our head around some practicalities of what we are after and have a lot of options with regards finance. Most of our ideas can't be firmed-up until we have more information but we can start identifying our values and learning more about the possibilities.

At the moment I have a book out from the library on small wind turbines, and I am looking at how micro-hydro (water turbines) and PV (photo-voltaic / solar) systems could be integrated to make the most of our resources and meet our power needs.

Hopefully once we know more about the practicalities of construction, crop cultivation, animal husbandry, power generation and use, and water treatment, we will know whether or not any property we look at will be a wise move, or just a liability.

Our Journey: In the Beginning

It's Christchurch, October, 2010. We know nothing. Stephen has just turned 9 months and is starting to walk. Captain has grown weary of Christchurch, a fact that has been shaken home by the incessant earthquakes that have bothered us and jostled us since the morning of September 4th. Housing in Christchurch is un-insurable.

October 29th, we get a visit from Captain's father, with whom we haven't spoken in about 5 years. He shares opinions with Captain about the generally dismal state of the world economy and environment. They often quibble on the semantics but both agree that things look pretty bad for the future of the world as we know it... but they are both curiously excited to be living in "interesting times". John expresses interest in building an "Earthship": an environmentally sustainable home made from reclaimed tyres and natural materials.

Now we're not really hippies; scientists maybe, family minded, pragmatists at times, survivalists perhaps, a little socially isolated, and certainly people who indulge in too many video games and have a penchant for apocalyptic science fiction. As a depressive "recovering" goth I had often had fantasies of running off to the wilds and building my own house somewhere. I liked the idea of something that we could build with our own physical labour. Having always been tight with money (or at least below the poverty line for most of my adult life), the idea of building a house without spending loads of cash was also appealing.

Captain has applied for jobs in Taumarunui and now Taihape. If he doesn't get one of them we will keep looking for positions in the North Island where we can be closer to the extended family.

Now all we need to do is figure out, how, where... and ultimately, when.