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we are in Lake City South Carolina and
the PD poultry Club is having a show
today I'm with Terry Anderson she's a
member here and our able assistant Lexus
and Terry um I've been holding this
chicken and I this rooster and I
understand it needs to get cleaned up
it's gotten a little dirty so I'm going
to hand this to you and tell me about
grooming chickens um anytime you're
entering chickens in a poultry show you
always want to make sure they're very
well groomed because they're going to be
judged and so the first thing you do is
you put them in a nice warm bath and you
always used a very gentle um type of
detergent and you didn't put much in
there just a little it doesn't it
doesn't take much you use a sponge for
cleaning because this really helps get
rid of the thing and there are numerous
ways of grooming chickens this is just
my favorite way so other people tell you
different things but you just take your
little chicken this is a little American
sarama he's kind of dirty a little
grungy and you literally just hold
him and you submerge him down in the
water and it's nice and warm now here's
the secret about chickens they'll stick
their head right down in that water so
you face their little head towards your
arm and this is for just bantams but if
you face their head towards the arm they
can't get their their head down in the
water so you just wash always in the
direction of the feather grows if it's a
smooth feathered chicken always
direction that the feather grows and
after you have washed all the top you
spread the wings out you make sure you
get all the little wing tips here Amanda
hold that chicken there you go um it
helps if you have a Helper and you make
sure you get the wing tips real good top
and bottom these are things the judges
are going to look at they're going to
look at everything make sure you get
their little butt good cuz the judge is
going to turn around and look in that
direction ction too so make sure that
that's nice and clean is clean the
business in once you've got the body
part um clean then you just take your
little sponge and you go carefully over
the head because the chicken nostrils
are right there at the head you don't
want to don't want to get water down in
those nostrils so if you hold his little
head up you can clean his head and you
really want to do a good job on his comb
especially on a rooster because that's
one of the things the little roosters
are very proud of and the judge is going
to be looking a lot at that little comb
you want it nice and clean so you clean
the little Waddles I'm doing a little
quick job here but normally you would be
really giving that close attention all
right now after you've got him all nice
and clean then you're going to take him
and rinse him so you just put him in
some warm rinse water same thing take
your little sponge and rinse him now if
it's a white bird like this a lot of
times you can put um some vinegar water
in here or you can put a little bluing
in in here that'll really help bring out
the white um now after he's all nice and
rinsed real well then we're going to
make a chicken burrito so you take your
hold that right there
Lexis take your little chicken and this
is just for bantams you can use a large
towel for large foul you take your
little chicken and you just roll them up
like a little chicken
burrito and there voila we have a little
chicken burrito this isn't the kind you
eat though um if you'll tuck him under
the
arm you'll have access to his feet oh
and then he can't struggle and you can
get to his little feet now the feet this
is an important part you want it really
nice and clean so use a toothbrush a
toothbrush all right and you can do this
before you rinse them if you want to
people do it different times but you
scrub their feet under their toenails
you scrub their legs really good just
like gardeners have to do when they come
in from the garden exactly right the
same thing and I use a toothbrush too
there you go yeah and cuz remember this
is probably going to have a little
chicken poop on it uhuh and if you'll
bend their little um legs down you can
get under those scales and you can get
that real nice and clean clean righty um
after you've got the feet clean while
you've got it exposed like this judges
do not like to see that little sharp
point or long toenails this boy needs a
pedicure all righty so we use exactly
that so you just take this and I wish I
had my glasses on but I'm going to make
it educated guest and you snip all
righty just to make sure you've got all
the little points trimmed off so it's
nice and neat and tidy and you need to
be careful cuz you don't want to cut
back in the quick just and it'll bleed a
lot now once you've got that you don't
want to leave it rough voila oh you're
so good so you just take your little
emery board and you file it down really
good now this is we need Vicky s Vicki
beri because she's our fingernail expert
oh there you
go um so you would file it down really
really well if this was a large foul
instead of a little bantom sometimes
they have Gunk stuck in that yeah so in
that case you would take a
toothpick and um you just have those
ready and you would just take a little
toothpick and dig out the dig the dirt
out you can also use ump qtips either
one and you would just dig you know the
dirt out from there to make sure it's
nice and clean so this is certainly a
two person process cuz it's important of
the Le times you've done it by yourself
oh yes many it's easier and this is a
small chicken that's right that's right
the large fowl are much more difficult
all right now once you've got that done
let's just say we've done the whole
entire process how you doing fella oh um
you want to make sure you get his little
head really really pretty cuz that's one
of those parts so here you hold that
Amanda and what we're going to do is
we're going to take and everybody has
their own little secret stuff that they
use this just happens to be mine and
it's a gel oil you can either apply it
with your fingers and if you'll notice
smells good oh now it's got some shine
to it his little eyes will Clos because
it feels good to him to get that massage
in and it leaves a real natural
appearance to him you want to take and
put a little bit even around the eyes
making sure not to get in the eyes just
to make this whole entire upper head
look very shiny vibrant and healthy yes
ma'am even down onto the beak rub a
little bit into that give it a shine
speaking of the beak um while we're up
here on this end if that beak has an
overlap and there's it's unappealing
looking you take those same little
snippers and you snip that little beak
part right off and they'll usually hold
real still for you and he doesn't really
have a bad thing so you just go like
that and you just snip it right off yeah
yeah I can see it and you don't want to
leave it blunt there again fingernail
file comes into play and you can file it
this is just like a a nail so it doesn't
hurt them it's not even uncomfortable to
them as you can see he's not even
struggling with that I'm not having to
fight with him at all to hold it um and
then at the bottom again um on his feet
you want to make sure his feet and legs
have a real nice healthy Sheen you can
use your exact same oil Vaseline
whatever your um you know substance of
choice is and you want to oil the feet
the legs the nails
to get everything really nice and um
shiny and healthy looking now let's just
pretend like we're done all right all
right on this little bird since he's
smooth feathered if he was dry already
and you use a blow dryer if it's Frizzle
I use a blow dryer on these smooth
feathered you don't you want to let them
dry naturally in the sunlight out of
wind and they'll dry and at the base of
their tail there's a printing gland yes
and if you will do this a couple of days
ahead of time the bird will naturally
pre his feathers and oil them and make
them look really pretty but at the very
last minute before you show him there
are some things you can do to just
assist that just to make it look a
little prettier just a little bling
bling on the chicken so they there are
several different kinds of sprays and
you actually spray the chicken and you
can just spread the little wings out and
this is if a chicken was dry of course
and you would spray a little bit and you
take a silk cloth and you actually is
this for chickens or is this just for
people no no that's people spray okay
but you spray and it actually the silk
cloths will um gloss them all up and
then they're ready to go in the cage
well it's a lot of work to get a chicken
but it's rewarding and everybody here
has had a great time thanks a lot yes
yes they have thank you Amanda
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