Any BP.neters have EMU's

Really thinking of picking up 2 - 4 emu eggs over the next month, hatching them and then raising them up. Wanted input from any of you guys out there that may have any or thoughts from any of you who just think I'm nuts.

PS, my wife is in the "your nuts" category......

They'd have a penned area 55 by 125 with 6ft fences and my rifle watching their backs for the coyotes, buggers are stalking my chickens and rats already.....

I think the cold has gone to your head! :tongue2:

I had emu a while back when I was younger. Just be sure to raise them with LOTS of interaction because when they grow up . . . watch out! Those coyotes will regret trying to get at them, trust me!

They can jump really well, we're talking needing six foot fences here (I see you have that covered) and can be annoying once they've decided they don't like someone/something.

Awesome guard critters though, I really want to get a pair later on.

I bought an egg on Ebay and hatched it in my little hovabator last year. It's amazing he ever hatched~ odds were against him (A hovabotor! When he hatched he burned his head on the heating element the fit was so tight in there!) We did not expect him to hatch and were not prepared so we wound up raising him in my kitchen. He beleived he was a dog. It was actually a very special expiereince for us all~ but A LOT of work with just ONE baby emu. Then he got sick~ and despite desperate effort to save his life........he died. It was devastating to the entire family~ even the dog.

You can read his story here~
http://thereddragonsden.com/Homestead08Feb.htm

You'll have to click through at the bottom to the next page and so on to get the whole story. When you read it~ read between the funny, sweet stuff and pay attention to how much WORK he was for me. It was not easy at all. And don't forget to pay attention to how devastating it is to the family when you lose a creature you've invested so much emotion into.

I see emu eggs for sale again. I've built the emu enclosure. I keep geese in it. But I won't do an emu again. The only way it would be such a wonderful creature would be if I raised it in contact with the family the way I did before~ but that was so MUCH work and hurt so much when he died.

On the other hand~ if you decide to do it~ look for a copy of the book "The Emu Farmers Handbook"~ it's not in print anymore~ I found mine on Ebay (I find a lot of stuff there). Don't over pay for it~ it's helpful.......but it wasn't helpful enough when I brought it to the vet with my emu. If you can't find a copy~ I don't sell my books (even when I don't need them anymore) but I'll loan you my copy. You'd have to pay shipping to you and back to me........AND PROMICE TO GIVE IT BACK (I'm a book horder~ I love books........if you borrow my book GIVE IT BACK!)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Cheryl Marchek aka JM

I bought an egg on Ebay and hatched it in my little hovabator last year. It's amazing he ever hatched~ odds were against him (A hovabotor! When he hatched he burned his head on the heating element the fit was so tight in there!) We did not expect him to hatch and were not prepared so we wound up raising him in my kitchen. He beleived he was a dog. It was actually a very special expiereince for us all~ but A LOT of work with just ONE baby emu. Then he got sick~ and despite desperate effort to save his life........he died. It was devastating to the entire family~ even the dog.

You can read his story here~
http://thereddragonsden.com/Homestead08Feb.htm

You'll have to click through at the bottom to the next page and so on to get the whole story. When you read it~ read between the funny, sweet stuff and pay attention to how much WORK he was for me. It was not easy at all. And don't forget to pay attention to how devastating it is to the family when you lose a creature you've invested so much emotion into.

I see emu eggs for sale again. I've built the emu enclosure. I keep geese in it. But I won't do an emu again. The only way it would be such a wonderful creature would be if I raised it in contact with the family the way I did before~ but that was so MUCH work and hurt so much when he died.

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Cheryl, great blog, really sorry for your loss. I've been online looking for the same kind of week x week info for several days had not stumbled across anything. We are still in the consideration phase, have the time and space just want to ensure that we are ready to devote the time needed to make them good pets.

Was going to get an Emu a while back, you can get fertile emu eggs off Ebay.....I think that its the coolest thing!!!

Raising the babies can be a pain(they get sick easy apparently). The subadult and adult birds seem pretty hardy and they aren't very expensive lately. I had a emu for a short while, and he was pretty placid. If you raise it around dogs, don't expect it to defend itself against feral dogs or coyotes. Raise it seperate, and it'll be a great guard though.
I'm in the "you're nuts" catagory too. But hey, you can always have the BIGGEST turkey ever for thanksgiving next year.

Get a Lama for the coyotes! :D I hear they are awesome watch dogs... Also, I worked on a goat farm when I was a teenager, and the lady kept Great Pyrenees dogs in with her goats. They take their job very seriously... My mother had one roaming her farm for YEARS, and she kept away any prowlers; coons, coyotes, stray dogs, etc... awesome breed!

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Originally Posted by Laooda

Get a Lama for the coyotes! :D I hear they are awesome watch dogs... Also, I worked on a goat farm when I was a teenager, and the lady kept Great Pyrenees dogs in with her goats. They take their job very seriously... My mother had one roaming her farm for YEARS, and she kept away any prowlers; coons, coyotes, stray dogs, etc... awesome breed!

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I have a Great Pyrenees and they are awesome guard dogs but they have to be raised in with what you want them to guard/protect. They have been known to take on bears and mountain lions. A single dog and can take on a coyote no problem!

If I ever have more land, I plan on getting an LGD (Livestock Guardian Dogs). I personally like Antolians (Probably spelled that wrong . . .)

Anyways, the neighbor called and she says she wants to give me her emu! How can I resist? If I take him I'll post him on here for you all.

Sorry to resurrect an old post but I was pretty amazed to see it asked. I have a pair of emus now, the hen of which is even a codominant color mutation! I used to have several emus, rheas, and a single cassowary. I'd nearly give my right arm to have another docile cassowary like that one. He was hand reared with a single emu and a single ostrich and he never showed any signs of aggression. Alas, when I took him to another farm with a female, he caught some pathogen and keeled over.

The rheas were always so fragile. I hatched countless eggs from the rheas but the chicks are super easy to kill. I've also hatched a few ostriches but they're also way too easy to kill.

The emus, on the other hand, are super hardy and generally very docile. In the hundred or thousands of emus with which I've interacted, I've only met two, both hens, that would stand aggressively toward a person.

I've been keeping and breeding emus off and on since 1996, right after that market crashed. I'll always have them. The mutation I have is called blond, and works the same way as pastel bps. When I breed her and her normal mate, each egg they produce has a 50/50 shot at being blond or normal. Two blonds bred together produces 25% normals, 50% blonds, and 25% of the "super," which in this case is a solid white emu. I haven't hatched any whites yet because I haven't raised any more blonds to adulthood, but I've seen several whites at a farm in TX and they are stunning. The blonds themselves are very cute when they're chicks, and noticeably different as adults but not quite as start as when they were little.

Here are some of my birds, both that I have now and used to have:

Henry, my breeder male and a great big feathery dog (he loves attention)
http://rvexotics.com/gallery/S_IMG_5350.JPG
http://rvexotics.com/gallery/IMG_1953.JPG
(with a female rhea)
http://rvexotics.com/gallery/S_IMG_5845.JPG
http://rvexotics.com/gallery/S_IMG_5680.JPG

Iris, his mate and my blond hen
http://rvexotics.com/gallery/IMG_1951.JPG

Chicks, blond and normal
http://rvexotics.com/gallery/S_IMG_5694.JPG
http://rvexotics.com/gallery/S_IMG_5628.JPG

Rhea guarding his nest
http://rvexotics.com/gallery/S_IMG_5843.JPG

Normal rhea chick
http://rvexotics.com/gallery/41019S_IMG_7352.JPG

Leucistic rhea chick
http://rvexotics.com/gallery/41019S_rheachicks3.JPG.jpg

Male rhea displaying
http://rvexotics.com/gallery/S_IMG_5715.JPG

Poor doomed ostrich chick (but cute!)
http://gallery.pethobbyist.com/data/41019S_IMG_3315.JPG
http://gallery.pethobbyist.com/data/41019S_IMG_3314.JPG

And my cassowary Darwin (on the left), with his potential mate Cassie. He was perfectly docile though he didn't like to be touched. He would eat bananas, grapes, etc out of your hand. She, on the other hand, would kill you if given the slightest opportunity.
http://gallery.pethobbyist.com/data/41019S_IMG_2532.JPG
http://gallery.pethobbyist.com/data/41019S_IMG_2536.JPG

Can I have the white one?

AWESOME! Thank you for sharing. I guess the niehgbor decided to keep her emu because I never heard back from them again, but I'd like to get a few later on anyways.

The white is BEAUTIFUL.

Hey chance, where do you live? I didn't realize that there was anywhere that private citizens of any country could keep a cassowary.. I guess there's more captive breeding than I thought?? I know they're pretty rare in the wild.

Sure ya can Bearded, just give me another 4 or so years :D

mainbutter, I live in Arkansas. I also didn't realize that private keepers had cassowaries until a friend told me about one of her friends trying to rehome their cassowary. I had gotten conflicting reports before then about cassowaries in private collections, and I have a book called the Emu Farmer's Handbook (vol 2), that discusses keeping cassowaries. The last thing I had heard about them was that a farm in California was producing them and charging something like $10-15k per bird. Well, this couple up in St. Louis had a young adult male they had raised from a chick and they needed to find him a new home. They said they wanted $500 for him, which is what they paid for him at an exotics auction where some Amish people had brought a couple of young cassowaries. Needless to say, I rented a trailer and was on my way that weekend!

He was a truly phenomenal bird and I regret loosing him so badly. I could stand out at his pen and just watch him walk around or eat out my hand for hours. On that last note, he was quite the rarity as far as mature cassowaries go. He never once postured as though he was going to become defensive. I interacted with him inside his pen many times. Of course once he was tending eggs, I expected him to be a different bird and he probably would've been, but just to illustrate how docile he was (don't try this at home with 99% of cassowaries!):

http://gallery.pethobbyist.com/data/...G_1552.JPG.jpg
http://gallery.pethobbyist.com/data/...G_1562.JPG.jpg
http://gallery.pethobbyist.com/data/...G_1569.JPG.jpg

Note the rather impressive inner toe spike:
http://gallery.pethobbyist.com/data/...G_1558.JPG.jpg

One of these days, I'd VERY much like to get another cassowary or two. I'm doubtful I'd luck into another approachable one though.

Hi Chance,

Fortunate you had a male cassowary that tame, the reason was probably because he had never been with another cassowary, or female. Regardless, he was a rarity for his nature. Either way, i've never seen one that stays that way, my friend had one like him, and one day it turned on him and stuck the spike between his knee, separating the joints...ouch. Anyway, it really sucks that you lost that bird. I have been keeping cassowaries for around 10 yrs, and they are getting very rare. Are you sure your bird got sick? Or did the female kill him? They should always be kept separate until they are ready to mate, then I open the separating gate and allow them to go together. The biggest decline in cassowary populations in the US are of 2 reasons. 1: they kill each other. 2: inexperienced people buy them in too cold of climates and thinking they are like emus, they freeze to death, or lose their toes and have to be put down. I have lost one male that I turned in with his mate one spring...I saw them breed 3 times. Well I got home from work and was shocked to find him dead. They had never fought, and always got along well for the most part when together. I was 100% sure he died of eating something bad...which is odd, because these birds are highly immune to toxins or any fungal or bacterial origins, and also alot of chemical. The fruits they eat in the wild are highly toxic, and they are the only ones that can eat them. Well, I couldnt find any sign of a fight, no damage, but his throat was slightly swollen. I had a autopsy done, and come to find out the female gave him one direct blow under his beak at the bend of his neck, and put a hole straight through his esophagus. Needless to say, the poor guy was done for. It was such a clean puncture that I couldnt even see the wound. Well, he was the only casualty I have ever had involving these birds. I now need another male, and I need to get this females spikes cut off by a vet. The guy in california retired a couple yrs ago, he was the best known and biggest breeder in the world at one time. Now he has nothing left, and im one of the few breeders in the US. I estimate there are only around 50 or less of these birds left in the US. Im having no luck finding a male. What are your friends going to do with that female cassowary? im always interested in buying up odd ball birds to help get their numbers up. Most people that have them, dont have mates for them, and arent breeding them. And most pairs wont get along.

http://s391.photobucket.com/albums/oo360/casuarius/ my cassowaries