RIP, Yami, and Kristin knows not to act on all her impulses, but likes to think about it!

[pacificpikachu]

My Black Japanese rooster Yamikarasu passed away last night. :( I will miss him--he was a part of our family for ten years, since he was only two days old. He was the last of my original three bantams I got--Dovey, Yamikarasu, and Houou. He was such a beautiful rooster, and while he certainly had his fierce moments, he overall was a great rooster and protected his hens well, tolerated us humans, and he had a memorable, funny, little high-pitched crow. It will be so strange not having him around... No need to really offer sympathies. While I am certainly saddened by losing him and will miss his presence in the coop, I also know he lived a good, long life and had everything a rooster could ask for. There's not much more I could wish for him. I suspected he might be going downhill, as he began looking "droopy" a few months ago.

Look at how pretty he was:



Rest in peace, my Yami rooster. ♥ You will be missed, and never forgotten.

I am now beginning a hunt for a new rooster. Finding free roosters is no problem, but the thing is that I promised myself when he passed away I would get a rooster of a breed I really like. This way, if the rooster fathers chicks with any of my hens, he'll create some interesting and beautiful crossbreeds. I'm a chicken snob, so this search could take a while! I may go to Yuba City to see this one guy's poultry collection, though--I'll e-mail him and see if he might have any roosters of breeds I'd love to get. I would love a bantam phoenix, a sumatra, or...well, I'll have to go through my chicken breed encyclopedias again in search of a breed I want.

I'm really into getting serama chickens at some point (the smallest breed of chicken) and button quail, but I would have to figure out housing for them because they're too small to be in the coop with everyone else. I'm still thinking of getting chukar in the spring, too, to add to the coop. Just three or four, probably. I would LOVE to get some bantam ducks at some point (little tiny ducks--squee!), but again, I'm not sure where I would house them right now. XD

lineaalba has unintentionally gotten me all into searching for interesting exotic animals I could keep in California. Unfortunately, just about everything interesting is illegal here, aside from awesome pheasants (which I want so badly) that I can't get because we'd have to build another large coop and that's super expensive. :( I'm intrigued by chinchillas and might be interested in getting one or a pair, but I'm debating, as I would need a large cage and the temperature limitations make me a little nervous. I've wanted a chinchilla for a long time, but I will only get chinchillas if I REALLY get to a point where I feel sure I want one and have done all my research/am comfortable with what they require for a happy life.

My mom says no more animals (she always says no more animals), but I can't help but look around and do research on different animals at least! I just love looking at different species and reading all about them. I'm also thinking about pygmy goats, though then we'd have to build an enclosure or figure out a way to house them. Or doves! I love doves.

I don't know, basically I'm just looking up all kinds of different animals to amuse myself at the moment, though if I find an animal I really feel fits my lifestyle, I may end up with something or another in a few weeks or months or whatever. I can't help it--I'm just one of those people who is so interested in animals that I like to experience having all kinds of different species. Of course, I know to stop when I reach a maximum amount that I can care for while still keeping their quality of life very high. For instance, I know that having another dog right now would be too much for me and my family.

I DO get to search for a rooster definitely, so that will help keep me occupied and control my obsessive pet-searching tendencies.

I find more and more that poultry and gamebirds are what I keep going back to as far as "oddball" pets go. I really, really enjoy raising them, spending time with them, learning about them, and so on. There are so many different varieties of poultry and gamebirds, many of which are incredibly gorgeous and amazing, and some species of poultry make such great pets and are quite friendly and tame, but are also fairly low maintenance. I like that my chickens, ducks, and guinea fowl are fun to handle and don't mind being handled, but if I don't have time to handle them or decide not to for whatever reason, they don't mind not being handled either! They're happy either way, and because I have a large enough coop and let them out to wander the yard a few times a week, I don't feel guilty about keeping them "caged". My whole flock of chickens, guinea fowl, and ducks is about twenty minutes of work a day, with occasionally more than that when the coop needs cleaning or I have to add leaves to stop it from getting too muddy. Poultry are just so nice! When I own property, I'm definitely going to have poultry and gamebird keeping as a major hobby. A very large chicken coop or a few chicken coops so I can keep all the breeds I want, some separate enclosures for different types of pheasants, quail, and other weird birds like that, and so on. Also, a fennec fox and my lovely Honey, and I'm sure other critters that I end up with, and I will be happy as can be.

We're getting another horse soon, a two-year-old thoroughbred named Taxman. I think mom is fostering him for now, but plans on probably adopting him. I'll take pictures of him (as well as our other horse, Rivi) when he comes. While I love horses, they're more my mom's thing than mine, but I still like to spend time with our horses, give them carrots, and take pictures of them. Our thoroughbred gelding Rivi is so pretty!

On a non-animal note (I am forcing myself to stop rambling about animals for now), I am 45k into my NaNo, and planning on getting another 2-3k tonight! I will probably have my 50k finished tomorrow. :O

Comments

[ensuing.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry to hear about your rooster. He was a beautiful bird.

Oh wow, you're just racing through your NaNo. O_o

[pacificpikachu.livejournal.com]

Thank you. I'll certainly miss him, but I feel okay about it because he lived such a long, full life, and just passed away of old age as far as we know. It's a good feeling, knowing that his life was happy and long. I feel more like celebrating his life than mourning his death, if that makes sense, because he had a good one.

Haha, yes! I've been doing 3k a day on average since the beginning of November (at Yaoi-Con, LOL), so naturally it's gone pretty fast. I'm surprised how well it's gone, though--last year was a lot more sluggish.

[placetohide.livejournal.com]

Just how many animals does your family have?

[pacificpikachu.livejournal.com]

We've got three dogs, three cats, two lovebirds, two cockatiels, two parrotlets, one horse, twenty-four chickens, three ducks, three guinea fowl, and a couple of fish.

It sounds really intense to care for all those animals, but it's actually not that bad, especially because the lives of my mom and I pretty much center around caring for the critters. They all have great quality of life, all get to come out of their cages/enclosures regularly (if they have them), get plenty of attention, and are properly cared for.

[astralvulpes.livejournal.com]

What a gorgeous rooster! Still, I'm sorry to hear that he's moved on, but it's wonderful that he had a full life.

California totally sucks when it comes to exotics. :( I wish they'd be a little more lenient (at least with stuff like ferrets, hedgeohgs and sugar gliders!) - but I know that really probably isn't on their priority list at all.

I've had chinchillas before, so I may be able to offer some insight if you have any questions.

And, it's awesome you're getting another horse. <3 I wish I could have one. I'm really in love with llamas and alpacas, so I'd probably have some of those to keep it company. XD

[pacificpikachu.livejournal.com]

Yes, he was downright beautiful. And it is unfortunate he passed away, I will miss him very much, but he did have a very full and happy life so I'm trying to let myself feel good about that instead of feeling bad about his passing, seeing as it was just old age. It's going to be weird, not hearing his crow and seeing him flapping his wings proudly...

It definitely does. :/ That said, regardless of the ban people do have exotics here quite a bit, so, you know, if I came across a chance to get some exotic or another I might give in if I felt it was precisely the right animal for me. But seriously, they ban just about everything here! There's a big movement to have ferrets legalized, at least.

That's good to know! I'll let you know if I end up needing more information on them. :) Right now it's just a thought, but we'll see once I've gotten a chance to think about it more, and also explored other animal options.

Yes, it is good! The only concern is that we're not particularly well-off, and horses are very expensive to keep, but my mom has been wanting to rescue another young thoroughbred for years and really likes Taxman. With the current horse crisis in the country, there are tons of horses needing rescue, so it's good my mom is helping take in a homeless horse. We'll see how things go with Taxman. ♥

Llamas and alpacas are funny! We have quite a few of them around here, and the alpacas in particular seem to be quite sweet and good pets. Someone was walking around a little alpaca...somewhere in public that I can't remember right now, and everyone was swarming the baby for pictures, haha.

[koyaaniisqatsi.livejournal.com]

Oh bb, I'm sorry to hear that he passed on. :c *hugs* ♥

I'm so jealous of you and your many animals.

[trf-chan.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry about Yami's passing. *hugs*