(Not the edible kind -- well, not edible yet.)

My wife and I are members of a local CSA that just started a program where you can help raise chickens in your home for 8 weeks and then either return them to the farm where they'll lay eggs for their useful lives or keep them to have your own fresh eggs. After 8 weeks is when they start to get smelly and need to be moved outdoors. Our HOA doesn't allow any farm animals, so we'll be sending them back after 8 weeks.

We picked up our four chicks (aka peeps) last Thursday and we're liking the experience much more than we thought. These little girls are all so cute

Video: http://img175.yfrog.com/i/srst.mp4/

The dog and cat are also fascinated by them, but they're not allowed in the same room when the cage door is open. My dog will stare at them for hours through the cage door, quivering and whining the whole time. At least she's not drooling.

That sound's like fun. I wonder how many db it would take to blow off all their down? Nah, might make 'em deaf, then they might not reach their full intellectual potential.

I would go crazy with the noise! Also, my wife would never let me get rid of them once she got attached.

She used to have a chicken when she was a kid and she would push it around in a stroller all the time she claims.

She also had a giant pig that was so fat it would get stuck on its side and they'd have to go push it over onto its feet every once in a while.

The noise is actually not that bad. We keep them in a large dog crate in the living room. Once in a while they do get excited and start peeping loudly, but it's so darn cute it doesn't bother us.

Sounds like fun.
What is the advantage for the end farmer, if I may ask. Time and a bit of $ are the obvious answers but I'd be interested to hear it quantified.

I couldn't make it past this part...

"Advantages for farmers:
* Get to spend time marketing the food early in the year, before their 16 hour days in the field begin."

I've been working with famers for the past twenty five years and have yet to see a single farmer spend 16 hours a day in the field ... a week at best, but probably more like a season.

What about farm workers?

Aren't those just collateral damage from Rick's insecticide spraying?

I hope your not into peep piercing.

Stop me! Stop me! I keep hitting myself (ourselves)!

Dude, ya gotta get outta the house more. Reading "news" from Wilkes-Barre?!

That's a different story.

Yep.

You ol' barnstormer, you! I can't recall how many mornings your Arizona colleagues wreaked havoc in my household, especially when my Viet Nam vet friends would come out to visit.

I've only been to Arizona once, in 2002 whenever I was fighting the Show-Low fire ... we were trying like hell not to get fire retardant all over your friends though.

I remember those fires. I lived in Cochise County, about 15 miles from the drug tunnel, er, ah, I mean the border. The people there welcome flame retardant. The only there that's combustible is them anyway.

I didn't spend much time there, we were based out of Denver City, Texas and was kinda in and out of the Show-Low fire ... in that business you get so busy working different places that sometimes it's difficult to keep up where you laid the suitcase from night to night. I sometimes miss it though ... mostly not.

Gawd, did I dislike living in west TX!

Lubbock is *OK*, Denver City kinda sucked ... Corpus Christi is a cool place. Where did you live Bob?

Rick: El pisshole. The only city in the U.S. exempt for EPA air quality guiedlines. You have to chew the air before you can swallow it.