I warned you...

I might go off on a tangent now and then. Trust me, if this blog was all grapes all the time, you'd soon be telling me this is one very boring blog. Therefore, I feel I must throw you a curve now and then, so today I present to you...

The Silkie Chicken. I.am.not.kidding! Those are chickens. And yes, they certainly do look silkie! Okay, here's the deal. Ya know how you have those special places on the web you like to check in with, on a pretty regular basis? Well, one of mine happens to be Craigslist. Yeah, yeah, I know all about the sociopaths lurking around on Craigslist, but I'm not too worried because my particular category of interest is the Farm and Garden section. I don't think Hannibal Lecter is hanging out there. I have a little list of items I'm always on the lookout for, and I go looking for them a couple of times a day. You might even say Craigslist Farm and Garden is my "happy place" on the World Wide Web. One time I found a dirt cheap Spring Rake for the back of my tractor the day after pricing a new one at Tractor Supply... I had to drive two hours round trip to get it but what a deal!

Anyway, I usually end up scrolling quickly through the day's postings in case there's a deal on one of the things on my list; as I tell Greg... "There are things I might need!" (for instance, I'm on the lookout for a large polyethylene tank, at least 1000 gallons, no leaking, and I don't want to pay too much, and bonus if it already has a valve fitting for a hose to attach). When I finish my first run through the list to see if anything I'm looking for has been posted for sale while I slept, I go back through again, more slowly, and check out all the weird stuff people have for sale. That is how I found the Silkie Chickens. The baby chicks are $2.50 a piece and if I knew what the heck to do with a dozen silkie chickens, I'd have already called that lady to make arrangements to pick them up.

Hmmm, I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that free-range chickens can be put to work eating insects in your garden. I wonder how they'd get along with my sheep?