# Site General > Off-topic Cafe > Introduce Yourself! >  Ball Pythons, Corn snakes........and Turkeys? Chickens too!

## Cheryl Marchek aka JM

Well~ I guess this is where I should start.

I didnt even realize I was already registered here.  I guess I registered a couple years ago to respond to a story that had gotten cross posted here.  No~ I didnt do anything evil~ I did something stupid and it got cross posted here!  Your welcome to look for it~ I think its kind of funny~ but I often think its funny when I do something stupidin hindsight.  Usually in the moment Im too busy cussing to see the funny!

So~ I came here looking for my friend Wilomn.  I dont usually go out of my way looking for people~ so FEEL SPECIAL Wes~ thats all the ego stroking your getting from me today!!!  You arrogant Son of a ..yeah~ we all know!  LOL!

Anyway~ as long as Im here let me introduce myself and see if any of yall share any of my newfound obsessions..

Ive been keeping snakes since 01.  Got a bit obsessed~ I tend to do that~ attempting to create a pied.  Started in 02 and spent more money and years trying to create that first pied than anyone else Ive ever heard of.Finally did in 08~ but it was a cheat win in my opinion~ Heather Wong (I think I saw her here?) actually produced my pied using my het female to her pied male.  So~ I winalmostnot quite.  Not until I DO IT!  (Thanks Heather~ you did great~ but its a cheat win for meyou did that not meI have to win on my own yet)



Beautiful isnt she?  I call her my White Whale and I hate her almost as much as I love her.  The effort put into producing her pretty much burned me out.  Im not giving up~ but Ive cut my collection drastically.  Well~ drastically for me~ Im down to somewhere around 70 snakes Im keeping (some adult BPs~ some subadults~ more 08 hets/poss hets than I probably really want and some corn snakes).  Considering how many I sold and just flat out gave away this year.thats a drastic reduction (somehow it still feels like too many, maybe I need to get rid of some more?)

But~ between finally producing that pied (I think I would have given up a few years ago if I wasnt such a compulsive personality) and moving from the suburbs of California to a beautiful homestead in Alabama I have developed a NEW obsession

 POULTRY!
Well~ and most everything Homesteading~ Im really very obsessed and have the best time!  Ive lost about 50 pounds since moving here.  No dieting~ just working from the time the sun comes up (and the roosters start calling to me) till the sun sets!  I have a bit more time right now as the sun is setting around 5pm~ but my time visiting on the internet has drastically reduced from when I was just a housewife in So Cal to be a homesteader in Alabama..

Im having more fun than Ive had in years.  Im keeping, breeding and eating my own poultry now.  Chickens, Turkeys, Ducks, geese and goats so far (my first goat will go to Freezer camp tomorrow I think.hope its not much harder to figure out than the Turkeys were~ a book in one hand a Turkey in the other (I bought the turkey on ebay as an egg, hatched in my basement and raised myself) in the other.


we learned basic butchering together!)


Last year (our first year on the homestead) I produced a lot of our own food here on the homestead~ 




(I built that barn all by myself~ and you cant imagine how proud of myself I am!  Or how much I hurt myself doing it!  LOL!)

next year I plan to do a LOT more.  I see yall have a Farm Animals forum~ Ill try to make time (intermittent when the sun sets early, it rains or snows..otherwise Im busy!) and maybe we can all fall in love with my new obsessions as much as we are with my old obsessions!

Have you ever hatched baby chiks?  You know you can buy these on ebay and hatch them in your hovobators right?
I hatched this in my hovabotor last year

Yep~ thats an Emu named Ebay (I bought the egg on Ebay).sadly he got sick and passed away~ but it was a fun adventure in homesteading in the meantime!


These guys did fine~ you saw some of their pics above!  32 new chiks hatched out day before yesterday~ 20 silkies set in the incuabator right now!

Homesteading stories to come~ as weather permits!

Nice to meet yall!

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_LadyOhh_ (12-15-2008),MarkS (12-15-2008)

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## OhBalls

Welcome! and ~~Please~~ share more pics of that adorable emu if you have them!

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## Cheryl Marchek aka JM

I have a lot of pics of him.  We loved him very much.  We did not expect him to hatch~ were shocked when he did and raised him in my kitchen for two months (WOW was that a LOT of work!)  If you want to read Ebay's story I kept a blog at that time~ but be aware I stopped blogging when Ebay passed away.  It was much too emotional for me~ I had become very attached to the little critter who thought he was a dog...............

http://www.thereddragonsden.com/Homestead08Feb.htm

If you don't want to read the sad story~ I would not want too~ the beginning is happy but the ending was so devastating to me that I stopped writing about our homestead     so.....Some happy pics of Ebay when he was doing well......

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## stangs13

I know some stuff about farm animals! Just holler. Great looking snakes and birds. What are you feeding your meat birds?

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## TheMolenater2

That Emu looks almost as spectacular as that Piebald!!!!  :sploosh:  :Good Job:

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## OhBalls

I'll certainly read his story.  I'm very sorry he passed, he was simply adorable.  I didn't know eggs were sold on eBay...good to know!
Thanks for the extra pics!

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## Muze

Hi There!

I am a member on Fauna too so I know you from there.  I gotta say, I love the pied, but I LOVE the emu.  So sorry to hear he passed.  The turkeys are pretty darn nice too.  Welcome aboard (back???)

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## filly77

> 


the cutest photo ever!!!!! Truly sorry for your loss. He was well loved, you can tell for sure!!

PS
that turkey looks delicious!!! Next year I'm coming to YOUR house hehehe

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## ballpythonluvr

Sorry about your loss of the emu.  He sure is cute in the pictures!  That is one nice looking snake you have there.  They are my absolute favorite, well along with spiders.  Welcome to the forum!

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## Cheryl Marchek aka JM

The turkey WAS delicious!

As far as what I feed the birds~ I've not been using a national brand name feed~ we have a little feed mill J&R in town I use their blends.  I usually start with non-medicated 28% protien game bird started.  More protien than the chickens need~ but it's good for the ducks and it's non medicated.  I'll switch to medicated if I ever have too~ but for now the non medicated seems to work well for me and I prefer to try it.  After about 6 weeks I switch to a 15% protien layer pellet.  A little early~ but I haven't been able to convince the birds that one feeder is JUST for the babies.......so when I mix new babies in they wind up eating what the adults are on.  I free range all the birds~ so most of the year they hussle for most of their food in the form of bugs, grass, weeds and seeds.  They eat a lot of table scraps~ chickens LIKE table scraps and garden extra's.  In fact~ if I don't remember to turn on the motion activated sprinkler in my garden the entire garden turns into supplemental chicken food that day!!

It's winter so I'm not getting as many eggs right now~ about a dozen a day~ but I have more pullets coming up and plan to increase that quite a bit.  As of now I'm able to sell my extra eggs for enough to cover the feed costs in summer (winter feeding is heavier while egg production is down so egg sales are not quite covering what I spend on feed right now)  The plan is for the egg sales to cover the cost of the poultry and give me a little cash as well~ and to provide us with all the fresh healthy free range meat and eggs we can eat ourselves!  We'll see how all these new chics I'm brooding integrate with the current flocks!

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## Seneschal

Wow...this is all so neat! I've always wanted a small flock of turkeys and chickens. I've been trying to convince my poultry-hating parents to let me get a couple fertile eggs shipped in. How would you reccomend incubating them? In just a plain hovabator?

Oh, and re-welcome to the site!
And I'm sorry about your emu. He was so adorable! And your turkeys are huge! How long do they take to get that big?

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## Melicious

Wow.  That's so awesome.  I hope you enjoy yourself here.

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## snakelady

Welcome! Looks like your homstead is doing great. I know you from fauna too...though I haven't been on there in a while. We talked about chickens a while back. Maybe you remember me from this: www.tarazod.com/filmsmadchicks ?
Anyway...
So, sorry your Emu died he was very cute!

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## wilomn

Hiya Crazy, er Cheryl, welcome back.

I'd preen, but who'd believe I was proud, meek and mild me, you know?

Glad to see you here. I thought you had gotten out completely at the end of last season. I'm glad you didn't. Such determination is admirable.

Thanks for looking for me.

Wes

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## Cheryl Marchek aka JM

Nope~ not giving it up~ too stubborn to give it up~ but I let it get NO FUN~ so I'm cutting the collection back down to fun.  Thinking I need to cut it even more than I have~ I still have somewhere between 50-70 snakes right now~ if you count the ones out on breeding loans it's even more.  Thats still too many for it to be fun I think.  Considering I'm not even looking forward to breeding season this year at all!  We'll see~ hopefully the enthusiasm will come back with fewer mouths to feed this coming year.

The poultry~ I've talked with SO MANY people about chickens this year snakelady!  I wish I could say I recall our conversation specifically but I just dont.  Nice to meet you again though!

Incubators~
I'm using the hovabators I used to use for reptile eggs (Have a big fridge incubator for BP eggs now).  I started with the still air ones and hatched a lot of chickens, turkeys and the emu in those.  Then this last summer I had a lot of babies go full term and fail to hatch so I bought the turbo fan kits for the havobators and just hatched 32 chicks in one the other day.  When the Turkeys start to laying again this year I plan to set the turkey eggs in the hovabators too!

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## LadyOhh

CHERYL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Glad to see you here my friend!!!  :Smile:   :Very Happy:

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## MarkS

Hi Cheryl, good to see you here.  I don't know if you'll remember me, we used to talk once in a while in Ralph's Chat room.  I've never been a huge fauna fan so don't post there much.   Hope to see you around here more often.  

Your poultry looks great, good luck with butchering the goats.  That should be interesting, it's probably a lot like deer.

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## Cheryl Marchek aka JM

Hi Heather!

Yes I remember you Mark.  Thanks for the compliments on the poultry~ I'm proud of them.  As far as butchering the goats~ Did the first goat this morning.  A little 2 1/2 month old mini buckling that came into his sexual maturity early and was trying like a real champ to breed my big Boar Doe.  It was actually a little funny~ he had short little legs and would launch himself in the air at her obviously just hoping to hit the target!  But I don't want my Boar Doe bred by that little mongrel mini buck.........so butcher day got moved up from sometime in January to this morning.  

Never butchered deer before~ so I don't know what thats like~ but it was a bit more challenging than poultry I'll tell ya that!  The killing part was bad~ gruesome.  But it always is.  The skinning part was a real challenge~ froze the skin and gonna try teaching myself to tan it later.  The meat in in the fridge resting for a couple days.  It was hard for me to do~ this was the first little goat born on our property........but it's what we got them for.....
The mother of that little buck is next~ thats going to be more of a challenge~ she is much larger~ but I want to serve her at New Years eve.

If your looking for a New Years party this year we will be having Roast Goat and BBQ chicken out by the fire pit.  Y'all are welcome to come on by~ bring your own beverages!

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## snakelady

> The poultry~ I've talked with SO MANY people about chickens this year snakelady!  I wish I could say I recall our conversation specifically but I just dont.  Nice to meet you again though!


No problem! The internet's a big place.  :Very Happy:

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