The Planetary Health Diet Egg
Denise >
Since the Welsumer hens (on the croft) got 50Mbps internet access via their own wi-fi router ‡, I presume that they must have read the BBC News website like us. Yesterday, there was piece on the website about the recommendations of a scientific panel for a diet that is good for health and good for the environment – that is, a sustainable diet. Meat – red meat in particular – is almost wiped off the menu, and white meat gets a reprieve. What surprised J and I, though, was that the egg ration was to be, in effect, just one quarter of an egg per day, per person. Our poor Welsumers must be horrified at this : what will it mean for them? After convening the council of cockerels, they resolved to demonstrate their solidarity with the predicament of mankind, and by extension, all the natural world. This morning, the Welsumers presented J with their prototype for The Planetary Health Diet Egg!
‡ J > Yes, it’s true! When I installed electricity to the henhouse, for lighting and occasional power needs, I installed also, within the the electrical enclosure, a wireless router. The primary purpose is to extend wi-fi across all of the lower croft : there’s no mobile signal, so this is how to stay connected when I’m working on the croft. Because the broadband at the croft is via fibre optic cable, which is not available at the walled garden, the hens have better internet service than we have!
Do your hens and cockerels have mobile phones or laptops? I wonder where they might keep a desktop?!
J > It’s just a convenient place to put a Wi-Fi ‘extender’, so that there is Wi-Fi signal covering most of the croft. There’s no mobile phone signal, so it’s a cheap and effective way to keep in contact whe I’m outside working. What’s handy is that the Wi-Fi router in the hen-house is connected to the main router in Carrick by the mains power cable. But in explaining the technicalities, it’s hard to get past the point where I say that the henhouse has wi-fi – it inevitably raises smiles and laughs1 So I’ve pretty much given up the explaining, I just go along with the joke!
It is hilarious! Lol!
It’s a good idea for safety; your cell phone can connect to a network to get you help from Denise if you need it.
Ha! Such a fun post!
What tosh nutritionists talk about such things! If I had followed their advice over the last thirty years I would have reversed my dietary habits every few months. Everything in moderation, my old father in law used to say (although I agree that we probably do eat too much meat as a nation). I love eggs, and they are firmly staying on the menu. Excellent source of protein, invaluable as an ingredient for baking, and so delicious when from happy outdoor hens.
That is funny! I’m sure when my new girls start laying, they will comply at least for a while. I lost one of my Java pullets to a hawk a few days ago. Now I need to improve my run or get those pullets to follow me back to safety when the dogs are out. It might be easier to retrain the dogs to leave them alone.
J > We shut a new batch of pullets in with the flock for 3 days so that they are settled in with the others : usually the pulleys stay in or close to the henhouse as they learn from the others where and when to go. We wonder whether having a pop-hole slider controlled by a photo-electric cell (meaning the hens know when the gate will shut from the diminishing light) is a factor. For the first three days after the pop-hole slider is reactivated , we go over to the croft to ensure the pullets are in
Normally I would have done that as well, but when they quit laying in the fall, my eldest and I put the old ladies in freezer camp, so the youngs started out solo in the coop. They will learn eventually, the first flock never had a teacher.
We get those every once in a while.
I have wanted to cook/eat them, but the wife always throws them in the compost before I can.
D > They ate perfectly okay – we always cook them. It’s all part of what it means to have real eggs, not mass-produced characterless tasteless eggs
LOL, we call those egg farts, or I have heard them called dummy eggs.. they are so tiny and cute..