Took your survey! :) To add to it--we keep our mixed flock of chickens as pets who happen to give eggs, and also they are great as little garbage disposals for table & garden scraps--which in turn gives us better eggs and chicken poop for the garden, which they also get a chance to 'till' at the end of the growing season. :) While ours are for entertainment/pets/eggs, when I was growing up we also had some for meat, which we killed & processed ourselves. Plucking chickens isn't high on my list of 'fun things to do' but I'm glad I know how--and home-grown meat tastes awesome and is far and away better for you. I admire people who raise their own animals for table. Our daughter is now 12 and has been around chickens her whole life, her observing and participating in the life cycle (we hatch chicks every year and do our annual 'Chickam' webcast of the hatch & next 8 weeks of life 24/7 which has been VERY popular) has really helped her understand and better mesh with the world around her. As a side benefit it's also helped her with science projects and simplified 'Facts of Life' talks! Yay, roosters! :) Velvet ~:>

We are remodeling our 1930s kitchen. The plaster is cracked and crumbly in some good-sized areas (2' by 4' and 3' x 5' approx). Our trusted electrician insists that the kitchen contractors should demo the plaster and replace it with drywall in the worst areas. The kitchen contractors (whom we've never used before) do not believe this is necessary, and that patching the plaster will be sufficiently strong. They say that if we apply drywall to the old plaster, the new cabinets will not fit, and it seems to me that the extra weight of drywall on already-cracked plaster will only worsen the problem. They caution against doing a complete plaster removal due to the expense and amount of dust. (2 people in our household have asthma, so this is an issue). One wall is exterior brick with no studs beneath the plaster. Another is terra cotta block, also without studs. Metal mesh lathe is used throughout. Because there are no studs, how can they anchor the new 42" solid cherry wall cabinets with either scenario? Without studs, will the brick-plaster or brick-terra cotta systems hold up? (Our previous cabinets were 32" metal). Chat room advice is as varied as my contractors'. I don't know whom to believe!

I haven't measured it, Johnny, but it is significantly less....based on how much less hen scratch we buy, I'd guess they eat 30-50% less hen scratch in winter when they have plentiful winter greens available to eat. It varies from year to year depending on how warm the winter is (warmer winter weather obviously means the winter greens grow/regrow faster and provide more for the chickens to eat) and on how much the chickens utilize them. Some years the chickens spend all their time in the greens, eating, digging, scratching and just doing other chicken things, but other years they spend a lot more time roaming around the pastures and even the woodland. I assume when they are in the woodland, they are digging through leaf mold and autumn leaves searching for insects beneath them. I sort of stumbled upon the winter greens accidentally when I planted a deer plot for the deer to have in a severe drought. The deer didn't touch the carefully planted and tended deer plot, but the chickens loved it. So, I took notice and started trying harder to grow more and more winter greens for the chickens. You realize that my chickens are incredibly spoiled, right? I plant big wide rows of lettuce and other mixed greens in late winter and spring in my garden and cut lettuce and various greens to feed to them all spring and summer. (I have to keep the garden gate closed at that time of year to keep the chickens out or the greens don't live long enough to grow big and produce a large harvest.) If you want to be happily greeted by chickens running towards you at breakneck speed, just walk out of the garden with an armload of freshly cut greens of all kinds, and the chickens will come towards you as fast as they can run. The poultry have given me many laughable "Foghorn Leghorn" moments, as the old roosters get stiff-legged as they age and run exactly like the old cartoon character Foghorn Leghorn. When I harvest greens for us humans, I have them hidden in a 5-gallon bucket so that the chickens don't know I am carrying greens up to the house. Otherwise, every trip I make from the garden to the house becomes a big chicken parade, with chickens trailing along behind me hoping I will drop something for them. It is ridiculous how happy you can keep poultry with just a random assortment of plant greens.

I understand your inspiration, what inlay are you actually wanting to use? The inlay in this picture looks like it is inset into the wood flooring . Almost like they routed (sp?) the item into the board after the boards were installed. If the inlay is set to go around the edges of the floor where walking is less likely to occur, I wonder if you can select a different style of inlay. Something that is not flat but is rounded maybe? that way the inlay can sit slightly above the wood and minimize some of the gaping. It is hard to make a judgment on this as we do not really know all the details. I am wondering if Schluter has a product that could offer a solution. Attached the Schluter catalog link below. Might be worth checking out. I do think that for what you want you are going to have to make some concessions. Do you want to pay the labor for someone to perfect the cut edges of the wood? Can you tolerate the imperfections for this look? The final solution is the one you'll be able to live with and be within budget. Either way that is a beautiful floor! I hope you keep us posted. https://sccpublic.s3-external-1.amazonaws.com/sys-master/images/hd9/h5a/8916622573598/Profile%20Brochure.pdf