Karina Jones is a real-life ranch wife in the Nebraska Sandhills and one of the most highly sought-after speakers in the cattle industry nationwide!
I’ve got a whale of a tale; I mean an egg-cellent barnyard story today on Ranch Raised.
It has been a while since Ive given you an update on the Motley Crew of cluckers. Unfortunately, the little band of 7 hens is down to 6. One day when I came home from the country fair, I shockingly drove in the yard to find our Border Collie puppy enjoying a chicken drumstick. The circle of life isn’t always pretty, people.
This summer has been interesting in the barn. The Black Austerlop hen has gone broody. She has been sitting on a clutch of eggs that wedged back in a corner of the barn that is hard to get to. She has been sitting on them for around 2 months. All I can say is she must have the patience of a saint. Here is the plot twist, we have no rooster. So all her effort is in vain. I need to get the eggs out from under, but she is in a really tight spot, if you know what I mean.
Meanwhile, across the barn, one of her clucking co-horts had a surge of maternal instinct and also went broody. After letting her sit on a clutch of eggs through the county fair, I decided this weekend it was time to break up her little party. To my surprise, the 6 eggs that I took out from under her all had a green shell. We only have one little grey hen who lays those green eggs, and she was not the broody hen. This gal has been freeloading the whole time!
These hens may only give me a few eggs a day and even less when 2 of the 6 are broody, but they give the kids and I whole lots of joy and that’s worth more than a dozen eggs anyway!
Karina ranches with her husband, Marty, and 4 children near Broken Bow, NE. She grew up in western NE, with roots also in southwest SD. The cattle industry and raising kids is her passion.
Watching the cattle industry go the path that it has gone, she could no longer sit quietly at home checking cows, fixing fence, and doing all the everyday tasks wondering when some else was going to make it all better. As she became more active and outspoken on industry issues, she was asked to join the R-CALF USA staff in September 2020 as the Checkoff Petition Campaign manager. That position transcended into her current role as full time Field Director for R-CALF USA.
You can hear her almost every Friday on Your Ag Network’s Hot Barn Report, where she deep dives into cattle industry issues and industry reforms. Listen to Ranch Raised on a Your Ag Network hometown station or www.youragnetwork.com where she talks about her daily life on the Jones Ranch.
Cattle producers are her people. She will meet you at the county fair, at the sale barn, or anywhere the dusty trail leads.
karina@youragnetwork.com or visit facebook.com/ranchraisedwithkarinajones
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