My Favorite Bird

Guest Blogger and WPA Youth Member, Ryn Swinyer, wrote an award winning essay in this year's Scholarship contest!

My name is Kathryn and this is my second year in the 4-H Poultry Project in Sheridan County. Last year I showed 9 chickens and 6 turkeys. It was a very busy show and was a little crazy. I thought I didn’t want to even show them anymore, but I’m happy to say that I have changed my mind. A lot has happened since last year’s show. My chick Rosie turned out to be a rooster! We found him a new home with another 4-H family that really wanted a frizzle.

It’s been really hard to choose a favorite bird because I love them all! When we were hatching eggs last spring, one of the other chicks we hatched was Moon. She is an Easter Egger cross and definitely one of my favorites. So she’s not a purebred and we showed her last year in the Backyard class at the county fair. She won first place in her class and the judge really liked her structure and smooth feathers. I hope I can show her again this summer. My other favorite is Jill. She is a Japanese Bantam that is white with a black tail. She’s really small and sweet. I plan to use her for my showmanship bird since she is small and easy to hold and show the judge all the parts.

Every day we have to do chores and take care of all the birds. I let them out of their coop into their big run each morning. They get black oil sunflowers seeds, Purina Layer crumbles, and some scratch grains. I also make sure they have fresh clean water each day. They have a heated bowl so the water doesn't freeze. In the winter we stir up the coop litter and add new shavings weekly, but we don’t clean everything out until spring. We clean it lots during the summer. My brother and I also collect eggs and make sure the nest boxes are clean, this helps the eggs stay cleaner. In the last week, both Moon and Jill have started laying eggs! We get about 10 eggs each day from our hens.

This year at the fair, I will be pickier about the birds I take. I will take Moon and Jill as my chickens. I hope to take our turkeys Cranberry and Cornbread. We thought they were hens, but they have shown us that they are boys! They are pretty boys, but can be naughty and like to pick on us when we do chores. I hope they calm down and quit being so mean so we don’t send them to freezer camp.