Mr. Erlich is an emu producer in Virginia, who is better know as the head of the internationally famous and appropriately avian-named Audubon Quarter. My kind host and guide was breeder manager, Ori Sahar. Kibbutz Ahor has the hatchery for all 3 and at one time can handle 40,000 eggs. The chicks go from the hatchery to the nursery where they are initially housed up on wire, in single bird pens. The chicks are fed a starter diet that is top dressed with chopped fresh alfalfa each morning.
Water is placed in troughs at the front of the cage just once a day in the morning.
After 3 weeks they are moved to group floor pens where they are kept for 3 days or so. They spend the period from 3 months of age to one year in large group pens. Most of the chicks are sold to the partner farms and some are kept as replacement breeders. While the 3-kibbutz enterprise is known as Jordan Valley Ostriches, the new breeder farm was named after a young member of the kibbutz who died in Lebanon. The breeder farm is high on a hillside, overlooking the paradise-like Jordan Valley and is only 2 km from the Jordanian border.