The magical ability of cows...

On Monday and Tuesday we had the chance to do some cattle work on the farm. Aside from driving around chicken buses, Farmer Mark also runs a cattle herd on his property. Our job - to help round-up, tag and emasculate all the new baby calves (and yes, emasculate is exactly what you are thinking it is).

We were all quite excited to start this new job, especially because it involved the cutest of the all the cows - babies! - but we soon realized that no matter how cute the calves are, giant animals that have fits of projectile shit can be really a downer.

The three of us - Bastiaan, me and Johnny (who is the new wwoofer from Wales - *insert sheep joke here*) - all headed out on Monday morning to separate the calves from their mothers.

The cows and their babies had been placed into holding pens already, we just had to now separate the cows into a different pen from the calves.

At first it was all "awwwwww they are so cute. Look at them with their moms, cutey wootey baby cows"

And then we watched the cute baby cow wander over to its mother. "Awwww" and then we watch it bump its cute baby head into her for attention "Awwwwwwww!" and then it made a baby cow moooo "AWWWWW!"

....and then we watched the mom just take a shit on its head. Just shit right on her baby's head. Everywhere. It was just everywhere.

It was about then that I realized that cows have this magic ability just to make it rain shit everywhere they go. I literally do not think they ever stop shitting. I swear I was standing about 15 feet from the nearest cow and shit still landed on me like it just rained from the sky. Twice. And that baby cow we saw get a royal shit on the head was only the beginning. By the time we separated all of the calves from the cows I was dirtier and smellier then I had ever been on the farm.

On Tuesday morning we all got up at the crack of dawn (literally 5:00am) because we needed to get an early start on tagging and castrating all of these calves.

I had the relatively easy job of documenting the entire process (ear tag number, M/F, etc) while the guys had the joy of  getting kicked, shit on and ran over by 168 baby cows.

This process was only supposed to take us 3 hours, but it ended up taking us 6 hours because every 5 seconds a mob of angry mother cows would bust through a fence in the yard and we would have to go chasing after them with giant rattles on a stick to herd them back out. Yeah, cows are scared of giant rattles. You can get them to run anywhere by making a slight jingling noise. Those long tube things that make rain noises when you flip them upside-down - those would be gold for herding mob of cattle.

 All and all, it was quite the long and smelly day on the farm.

Elise

The chicken that tried to commit suicide.

So every morning a couple of of us jump on the quad bike (which is now just sparkling and completely spider-free) and drive around to all of the chicken buses. It is mainly to check and make sure the chickens are a) alive, b) have food and water, and c) aren't starting a revolution to kill all humans. We also usually take a couple of the working dogs with us (Sandy the Beautiful, Submissive Claire and April ADHD) and they happily sit on the back of the bike and come along for a ride.

One morning Bastiaan had the brilliant idea to bring all 5 dogs with us to check the chickens.

Me: "This is a really bad idea."
Bastiaan: "No, it will be awesome!"
Me: "This is a really bad idea"

Well, I have to say that it is quite a challenge to have 5 dogs in the back of the quad bike when one of them (Boris the Disgusting) is trying to make sweet sweet love to Sandy the Beautiful (who is also his mother...but Boris doesn't seem to mind the whole incest taboo as he has previously impregnated his sister - hence the existence of April ADHD).

So because it is awkward (on many levels) to drive a dog-humping quad bike, never again did 5 dogs join us on the morning chicken check up.

ANYWAYS,

Yesterday morning Bastiaan and I took 3 dogs on the back of the bike to the the normal run around. When we got to the first set of chicken buses it was my job to check the ground for any eggs (these are collected and fed to the dogs that guard the buses at night). After 3 weeks on the chicken farm, I generally know the areas that we will find eggs on the ground. Chickens may be murderous cannibals hell bent on dominating the human race, but they still comply with the general rules of offspring survival - a.k.a. don't lay an egg in the middle of the grass so that an eagle can see it from space.

So I was looking for eggs behind the tires of the chicken food trailer when I saw a chicken trying to commit suicide.

See if you can picture this:
The trailer tires are about 3 feet high, the top of the axle sits about 2 feet off the ground - and a chicken is about 1.5 feet high. This suicidal chicken had managed to jump half way up the tire axle and somehow catch its neck between the tire and the axle - suspending its stupid chicken body about 2 inches off the ground.

I thought it was dead. I even poked at it a couple of times with a rake to make sure. I also didn't really feel like prying the chicken who committed suicide off of the tire so I simply told Bastiaan that a chicken had committed suicide on the trailer and that maybe he should gather it up before the other chickens realize there is a dead chicken in their presence and they peck its face off (and by face I mean all of its insides).

Well apparently, when he pealed the chicken neck off of the tire, the stupid chicken actually took in a gasp of air, made some chicken noises, and and started walking away like nothing ever happened.

I have NO IDEA how long it had been hanging itself, but now the apparent immorality of the chicken adds an entirely new element to their murderous ability.



So the chicken my not have committed suicide via hanging but, I still stand my statement that this chicken did commit suicide by throwing itself in front of the truck while I was driving...

Or it was already dead before I got there and that's why it didn't move out of the way.




I did not swash a chicken with the truck.





I also did not swash a chick with its water container.





All suicide.






Elise

The biggest spider that has ever existed ever.

So when we are not collecting eggs, carrying eggs, throwing away eggs, eating eggs (seriously how many eggs is healthy to eat in one day? is 6 too many?), we are working odd jobs around the farm.

Yesterday I took on the job of cleaning the quad bikes. I really don't think they have been cleaned since the dawning of time. The 'mud' (aka cow shit) that I has to scrape off of the underside of one of the quads was unreal. I tried using the hose, then a stick, then I gave up and was using my hands (GLOVED!) to clean this bike.

Well one of the other workers, Bastiaan, was helping me to clean out some old buckets from the back of the bike before I hosed down everything. I don`t know where these buckets had been sitting, my guess is somewhere evil, because apparently the biggest spider that has ever existed to the world had been living in one of them. Only when I saw the spider it was not in the bucket anymore....

ME: ``BLLLAAAHHHHHH ARRGGGEEEEE  AHHHHHHHH! THE BIGGEST F%$#IN SPIDER IN THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE IS ON YOU!!!"

I'm quite afraid of spiders, especially in Australian where most of them can kill you.

ME (about 30 feet away by now and yelling): " IT'S ON YOU! IT'S ON YOU! IT'S ON YOU! BLAHHH"

So I ran away (quite gladly) and did get the Poisons Spiders of Australia book. While Bastiaan (quite calmly) let the biggest spider that has ever existed ever, just crawl around him.

So I got the book and we looked up the spider (while it was still on Bastiaan) and it turns out it wasn't so poisonous.


Doesn't make it any less terrifying.

Elise

Chickies!!! :D :D

Grown chickens may be terrifying, but nothing is cuter then a day-old chick. About 3 times a year Farmer Mark gets a batch of new chicks to raise that will replace the oldest chickens on the farm (how can you tell they are the oldest chickens on the farm?....well, most of them are pretty much so featherless that they begin to look like the chicken you find in the supermarket...only these will still murder you in the night.)

So to replace the increasingly ugly and unproductive chickens, Farmer Mark gets new cute little baby chickens. On Thursday, September 1st, 1200 chicks arrived at Papanui Farm and we all fell in love. After unloading boxes and boxes filled with little, fluffy, cheeping angel birds, the three of us just sat in their pen and cuddled chicks.

I've decided that even though chickens are evil creatures,

I

LOVE

CHICKS

SOOOOO MUCHHHH!!!!!

...and they love me!


The chicks need to live in a perfect environment in order to avoid dieing. This means that the temperature in their enclosure needs to just right....somewhere between 26*C and 30*C. Farmer Mark has set up this temperature warning system that monitors the warmth of the enclosure and sends out a warning alarm if it is too cold or too warm.

This is literally what the alarm is:

And this could ring at all hours...

Well, this weekend Farmer Mark had to leave the farm and decided to give us 3 radios that would broadcast an alarm if the chicks needed attention. I have to say, Adeline and I slept perfectly all weekend - not once did the alarm wake us up....but that was probably because Bastiaan was so concerned with making sure we didn't cook or freeze any of the chicks to death, that he basically began caring for them like they were his fluffy, cheepy babies.

....I think one night he was up three times to check the chicks after having terrible dreams that they were all dead. All 1200. Just dead.

And it was quite considerate of him to turn down the alarm so it didn't wake Adeline and I up.

Now after 2 long nights (for Bastiaan) Farmer Mark is back and he returns to most of his chicks (minus a couple here or there...)


Elise

I met some chickens...

For those of you that don't already know, I need to work 88 days on a farm in Australia in order to earn my second year visa. Yes, on a real farm. And yes, like in the outback somewhere. I know, it is crazy. But I can't argue with the Australian government on this one (they will deport me) and so I've headed off to New South Wales to work on a farm.

On Tuesday, August 31st I left my hectic city life in Melbourne and headed to the country. My first stop - Papanui Farm (www.papanui.com.au) - an open range egg farm. Now, when I tell most people I choose an egg farm then immediately tell me how bad it is going to smell. "Ew. chickens smell." Well, these chickens don't really smell because they don't live in a barn....they live in buses. Yes, like school buses. Check out the website you will see.

So, I'm living on the farm in a special little backpackers' house with 2 other travelers - a girl from Scotland - Adeline and a guy from Holland - Bastiaan. Every morning at about 8:00am (btw I've completely lost the ability to sleep in anymore. Wide awake at like 6:56am on the dot!) we head out onto this vast piece of land (the farmer has a total of 2200 acres!) and do a morning check of the chickens.

Well when you first head out on a beautiful Australian morning to check the chickens you soon realize that chicken poo, and its related smell, is really the least of your worries. Especially when you are about to approach about 1000 free run chickens. 

When most people think about chickens, they like to picture these birds in the cutest possible light. Such as...

They are usually never that cute. Well, maybe for a week or so. Nevertheless, the next usual vision of the chicken is something like this:

Now, most people would agree that this picture of the majestic chicken is pretty actuate. Well, these people are stupid. These people have never been on a chicken farm, these people have never stepped out of a truck and had 1000 chickens look up and begin running towards you. "Aw, but they are just curious birds!" these  people will say. And I agree, I also just thought they were just curious birds. But I soon discovered that these were curious birds FROM HELL. When your surrounded by 1000 birds pecking and squawking and  pecking and more pecking, you soon see the chickens' true nature. They are EVIL. They are zombie birds that feed on the flesh of the living and will not stop feeding until they have pecked every last bit of skin from the bone. This is a true chicken:

This is what a chicken is. On my first day on the farm I saw the insides of 3 chickens.....and I'd really like to tell you that all three of those chickens were dead before I saw their insides (perhaps murdered by foxes?) but no, no, no. When all of a sudden the chickens stop paying attention to pecking through your boots to get to your delicious toes, you need to worry because there is a chicken murderin' about. Usually, you need to walk up to the feeding frenzy and kick a couple chickens out of the way to see that, in fact, they are eating a chicken. Chickens eating a chicken. wtf batman.

I also quickly learned the chickens LOVE the taste of their own eggs. hmmmm? Give a little think to that one. If you are collecting eggs and drop one, it's all over. I once saw a chicken start insanely pecking herself to get some egg off. Sweet, sweet egg.

Have a look for yourself...

The feeding frenzy...

So, Chicken Farm Lesson #1....never turn your back on the chickens.

Elise