Have any of you experience with chickens? If so, you'll know that they are perhaps the dumbest of God's creatures. Their by products are tasty, but their brains are an afterthought. I have a small backyard flock myself. One of the newer little ladies is a bit confused when nightfall comes. Rather than retire to her beautiful little coop, she'll hop the fence (ala Chicken Run) and nest where she delights. Last night it was in a holly shrub. I spent a good part of 20 minutes looking for my wayward bird. I then had to extract her from said hedge, discovering that I might be a bit allergic to the prickly leaves. Brilliant.
The reason it took 20 minutes to find Miss Lucy is due to the nocturnal habits of hens. As dusk approaches, they'll settle in and shut down all but the most vital of systems. All that remains is respiratory and circulatory. You can call for them to no avail. They won't rustle about if they're already settled, even if a fox bites into their tasty bodies.
What I need is a little voice activated responder that I can attach to their leg, similar to ID bands. When I walk about the garden calling "Marco", it will reply with "Poultry!". I can then find the bird, regardless of their mental state.
Perhaps my neighbor has the same system and is finding my chickens. Change channels and the call then becomes "Christopher - Cockerel" or "Amerigo - Broody" or "Vasco - Da Gallus".-- bdag, Nov 04 2009 Wedlock http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0103239/Rutger Hauer stars. [8th of 7, Nov 04 2009] Keyringer http://www.keyringer.com/This might help you. [wagster, Nov 04 2009] (?) Looking for a chicken can be dangerous, but it can help your hair start growing again also http://weekendameri.../lightning_strikes/Slow to load, but it suits MY sense of humor. [normzone, Nov 04 2009] Like the name....[+]-- xenzag, Nov 04 2009 When I'm really hungry I do enjoy some nicely roasted macro poultry-- hippo, Nov 04 2009 Wedlock. <link>
If it blows their head off, they'll still be able to run home ...-- 8th of 7, Nov 04 2009 Thanks for the link to the keyringer wagster, but it'd be a wee bit cumbersome for the application. Plus, I'd rather not blow out my little ladies' eardrums. Sustained 106dB until I find and catch the bird? Wow. That's like riding a motorcycle.-- bdag, Nov 04 2009 lubbit [+]-- FlyingToaster, Nov 04 2009 Marco Pollo.-- phoenix, Nov 04 2009 [norm] yes, but what about the chicken ?-- FlyingToaster, Nov 04 2009 I thought about Home: Pet: Attachment but chickens aren't much of pets and this really has more in common with a GPS locator than anything else. More of a Voice Positioning System if you will.-- bdag, Nov 06 2009 There would have to be some sort of voice activated chip to recognize the sound and cadence of the password and then call out the return phrase. So, yes, computers would be involved.
But as you'll note, my idea has been moved to Product: Inventory System which makes more sense than the other two categories. Thanks, admin.-- bdag, Nov 06 2009 They all have to have different voices though:when you call out "Marco" you can tell which ones' not in the coop.... and of course for the expression on vistors' faces when they say "mark..".-- FlyingToaster, Nov 06 2009 random, halfbakery