My Weapon Of Choice: The Appalachian Dulcimer

 I first started playing the lap dulcimer (also known as an Appalachian or mountain dulcimer) in the 1980's--it's easy to play basic melodies, and you can jazz up your music by throwing in chords. I got started learning by taking lessons from Dorothy Chase at the Folk Music Center in Claremont, California. The Folk Music Center has been around since 1958, it's a store but also a VERY cool museum. Please do go if you ever get a chance, it's amazing! I also got to work the Folk Music Festival they put on and made a giant banner for the stage. Big fun!

 

Right now I have two dulcimers: a small, tough-as-nails 'backpack' basic Rugg & Jackel Folkroots dulcimer that I got in the early 80's and have strapped to my back and dragged around to every Renaissance Faire and folk music festival around, hence the ribbons and bells on it. Folkroots got sold to Folkcraft after mine was built, so funnily enough this inexpensive  instrument has increased in rarity/value. The other is a lovely Blue Lion that is my main instrument (and is MUCH larger than the Folkroots model). The Folkroots dulcimer has a high, bright sound, while the Blue Lion has a deeper, richer, very sweet tone--and it's LOUD, with tons of sustain. Just to confuse the uninitiated, there are also hammered dulcimers--huge trapezoidal instruments that you stand in front of and whale away on with little wooden hammers held in your hands.

 

Dulcimers have diatonic tuning (like the white keys on a piano), so yeah, weirdo spacing on the fretboard. This makes not looking at your fretting hand because you're looking at your sheet music next to impossible.

 

And you have to not look at your left hand, because when you do, you lose your place on your tablature--instead, you have to develop muscle memory as to where the frets are, kind of like on a violin...but at least dulcimers have frets. Oh, that's the other thing--dulcimer music isn't scored using the musical scale, because being gluttons for punishment, we use tablature! Did I mention there are also a BUNCH of tuning modes for dulcimers, because why make things easy? Throw in the capo you often have to use and it's enough to make one weep. Jam session folks hate to see us coming.

 

The tuning mode thing makes for...not so much dulcimer tablature being out there. So, I spend time watching YouTube videos of people playing songs...and then sit and tab it out. First figuring out the tuning, then rewinding the video 9 bazillion times so I can watch their fretting hand and get the notes right.

 

But it's worse when the instrument they play isn't a dulcimer and I have to pick the tune out by ear. Then I have to replay the video even more often.

This is pretty much the opposite of fun.

 

But anyway, here they are:

Wait...is that...blue painter's tape on the Folkroots' fretboard...?

Why yes--yes it is.

You see, that instrument didn't come with a 6 1/2 fret, which is something dulcimer players discover pretty quick is something they really, REALLY need (and the Blue Lion has).

So shortly after I got it, I cheated in a 6 1/2 fret using a broken-off paper clip and masking tape.

Yeah, baby, classy.

 

But hey, it worked for the short term, and I figured at some point I'd live it up and get a real 6 1/2 fret put on the instrument.

 

Twenty years later, the tape and paper clip were still going strong. So heck, I left it that way. It was only this year that the masking tape gave out. So blue painter's tape it is!

I still plan on getting the poor thing a real 6 1/2 fret...someday.

 

These days people are creating tablature for dulcimers with a fret at 1 1/2, as well. I won't get one installed on the Blue Lion as it would cut right through the little bird inlay. Luckily it isn't as important as a 6 1/2 fret is.

 

But my Blue Lion won't be upstaged when it comes to fussy, 'Me, me, ME' neediness.

Recently I got a new set of strings for it. Took the old strings off, cleaned & polished the instrument. Putting on steel springs isn't kind to your fingers, and involves getting stabbed quite a bit. Then I remembered, we have a string winder! Cool, I can save a LOT of frustration and time using it!

But...

LOL, the universe having a perverse sense of humor, the peg heads are too big and won't fit inside the string winder.

*sigh*

Cue me winding strings on by hand.
 

The kid has joined a ukelele group. So for about the last 8 months, every week when I drive him to practice, I sit out in the hall and get in a couple of hours of dulcimer practice. The classes are held at our town's community center/senior center, so there's always people walking by who stop, stare, and inevitably ask, 'What is that?!' It's neat to introduce folks to an unknown American instrument. Even better when I tell them what dulcimers are related to...of all things, bagpipes.

No, really!

When Scottish and Irish people settled in the Appalachians, they missed the sound of bagpipes (go figure). So they created dulcimers, where the melody is played on the first two strings (the ones side by side, at the bottom edge of the fretboard in the pics above), with the other two strings strummed as drones. It creates a sound very similar to bagpipes! But sweeter and without all that squealing.

 

Which brings us to tablature. You don't need to read music to play a dulcimer, instead you use a numbering system with the numbers indicating which fret the fingers of your left hand will use.

But...dulcimers not being wildly popular, tablature tends to be hard to find, with the pickings slim and mostly confined to old-timey standards or hymns. Consequently dulcimer players share tablature like mad, and put up videos online.

And some of the tab I've run across is downright evil, in that it appears to be scored for men with hands the size of dinner plates.

 

 Here's the fretboard on my Blue Lion (which by the way, is the normal size for a dulcimer).

 Dulcimer players usually use their thumb and first three fingers of their left hand to fret. The example above wants me to place my ring and middle fingers on the first frets (at the bottom of the little bird's tail), and my thumb on the fifth fret (at the base of the rose part of the inlay).

Yeah, not gonna happen.

To make matters worse, you fret using the side of your left thumbnail, which shoots your manicure to shit and you end up with this:

Those two grooves are courtesy of the very tight melody strings. And YES, they hurt, and make playing a swear-laden trial as your thumb and nail are filleted (I also play banjo, so I'm used to sadistic fretting issues on way-too-tight steel strings that are out to cut a bitch).

BUT!

For Christmas I got a few things to make playing easier. Nifty gray thumb sock (marketed for Smartphone users) protects the side of my thumb while still giving an acceptable 'feel' to find my place on the fretboard. The neato Delrin picks in the thin size I love cut 'pick noise' to nearly non-existent, and the little stick-on rubber things trimmed to fit my picks keep the pick in my hand, rather than flying across the room to take out someone's eye.
 

 

But back to bad tablature. I had a bad feeling about this, and as I checked the tab I'd downloaded, quickly found that this type of sadistic tab had snuck its way into a bunch of the songs I had. 'Meet Me In Dreamland', a very pretty song, had the dreaded 1-5 stretch (underlined in blue).

 But at least I've got a good use for one of my fingers for this thing...

 Becase HAH! I've figured out a workaround!

Mine sounds better, anyway, so there.

 

Some of the other impossible freakin' left hand positions I ran across:

 And this evil POS later reversed that hand position.

When they aren't trying to split your hand in two, they want you to fret with your hand curled up like some mad, contorted crab until you develop a fatal hand cramp.

This sort of nonsense led to me feeling free to make sweeping changes in the tab. And then there's the tab that is simply...incorrect. Some of which I suspect was assigned to an AI program to tab out, they're so screwed up. Of course, sometimes I discover later what works, and what, despite tons of practice, never will...which leads to frenzied, scribbled changes.

 

 It just got worse and worse. Because I damaged both hands in a fall years ago, I have to get creative with left hand finger positions, LOL. The red dots are a marker for me: Watch out, weirdo chord coming!

 

So scribbled up that it looks like something the hard-bitten detective on a TV show would find at the crazed killer's apartment crime scene.

Sometimes I resorted to creating my own tab when I couldn't find one for the song I wanted. I now have a double-sided list of songs I plan on tabbing out.

 

...because every musician needs to be able to play 'Girl From Impanema'...don't they?

I started tabbing the song out as a joke...but heck, it actually sounds really great in that tuning!

 

Chickam 2024 Chicks Two Months Old!

Year 16 of Chickam!

After a start loaded with ups and downs, this year's chicks have proven to be remarkably normal. We ended up getting ten chicks, and with such a good outcome I'm thinking that from now on I'll set eggs in mid-April, aiming for a May 1st hatch date. Uptown Bus played momma this year for the first few weeks, but when the brooder box began to get too crowded and she was ready to quit we put her back out into the flock.

Pardon the goofy beach towel background, several of the chicks were so tall I had to use a larger towel for a backdrop. Also, this year's best pics all feature my kid's (he was playing chicken wrangler) arm in the shot. *sigh*

So here they are, in order of hatch!

First is Big Cluckin McGuckin, a little rooster hatched from an egg laid by Swiffer, our frizzle bantam Cochin hen who passed away just before Chickam got underway. We incubated three of her eggs...and all turned out to be roosters. I think it's just Swiffer's final FU to the universe. Not sure who McGuckin's daddy is--possibly Bobbie, our buff Brahma rooster.

...and the typical leeeaan to the left...

Blaziken, who has either Basil (highly likely) or Rapunzel for mom and Bacon for a daddy, both tiny bantams. Blazi suffered several instances of being injured from momma Bus and her larger siblings treading on her. She's still gimpy and since her hatch has required a handfeeding boost to keep her going. She tended to hide a lot, so while the other chicks went out into the flock today, Blazi is staying in for another week or two to build up strength/walking ability. Her brother Mammon is also staying in to keep her company--also, both of them are so small they could slip right through our chain link fence.

Blaziken has her daddy's facial fluffies.

Blazi might be being the tiniest bit judgemental...

Big Nasty, another Swiffer/Bobbie chick. All three of Swiffer's boys are cookie cutter images of each other, very pretty boys.

Mammon, Blaziken's brother with Rapunzel for mom and Bacon for daddy. He sulked during picture time and wouldn't hold his tail up.

Grump, grump, grump.

Grug!, one of three blondies this year and a rooster. Grug! has Dubious Intentions for a mom, Mjolnir is daddy. Pathologically friendly, Grug! spent most of his time out of the box running around trying to con any available human out of goodies from the fridge.

Sticky, the little hen hatched from the Americaunas (either Peanut or Cheese is mom) egg that was so badly cracked and taped back together. Sticky is very friendly, and has Eggroll (blue laced red Wyandotte roo) for a daddy. She has Americaunas face fluffies and striking wings, with varied plumage that reminds me of Bonesaw, one of our other hens.

Please admire her ORANGE legs.

Takoyaki, a lovely little gray hen who ended up showing off her grandfather Cam's Giant Cochin plumage! And weight, Tako is gaining some serious chicken meat. She also carries her tail down most of the time, as Cochins do. With no sign of leg feathers, Tako likely has Eggroll for a daddy and one of our black Giant Cochin mix hens for a mom.

Derp. Stand on your own feet and do the 1000-yard-stare thing.

Owl, the last Swiffer rooster. A beautiful boy and the sweetest of Swiffer's chicks.

Thunderfuss, momma is Imminent Disaster, Daddy is Mjolnir. The first chick to show up as a rooster and very bold. Although he pouted during picture time...

And leaned.

Lastly, Snack, another blondie hen and a sweetie. Momma is Bort Grungus, daddy is Mjolnir.

That's all ten of the chicks this year--four hens and six roosters!

Year 16 Of Chickam!

 This year got off to a bit of a faltering start.

To begin with, we had to delay Chickam. First because while we traditionally hatch chicks over Easter weekend, this year Easter fell on March 31st--while it was still too cold to get quality eggs, with the chickens not sufficiently revved up and in full breeding season ninny-headedness.

Also, there was me having to have major surgery--last September I was diagnosed with Severe Aortic Stenosis, and on April 30th of this year underwent a TAVR procedure to replace my aortic valve. While all went well (thanks in large part to friends and family who donated), it meant that Chickam got pushed back to a hatch on June 8th.

But this turned out to be something of a serendipitous event--the chickens were in full swing, with no danger of freezing temps harming the eggs. 

On May 18th I set 29 eggs in our ReptiPro incubator, and on the 10th day of incubation candled (held the egg with a bright light under it to see inside) them to check for viable embryos.

Out of those 29 eggs, 22 had developed chicks!

21 Embryos 

1 I suspected had quit, but I kept in it anyway to give it a chance

7 Duds (no development, these were removed)

Of the 22 viable eggs, 6 are bantam eggs, the rest standard-sized eggs. Thanks to M. sitting out in the coop to see which hen laid the eggs, we knew some of the moms of the 22 viable eggs: Bort Grungus, Scraunch, Pickle, Gretchen, Dubious Intentions, Imminent Disaster (not sure), Nyx, Rapunzel (bantam, 2 eggs), & Swiffer (a frizzle bantam Cochin, 3 eggs, God help us). Swiffer's chicks will carry the frizzle gene, but may be smooth coated. We'll know as her chicks' wing feathers come in--curled feathers means a frizzle! Swiffer's eggs are important because Swiffer passed away suddenly on June 4th, four days before the hatch.

But when things are going well, is when things will start NOT going so well. One week before our hatch date, at dusk one day the power went out.

 It didn't come back on right away, and I knew the ReptiPro would only hold the 99.5 temperature the eggs MUST have for a few minutes.

But we had five broody hens out in the coop! The kid rigged a cardboard box and an animal carrier with hay to serve as nests, and ran out to bring in two of the broody hens. We tested them in the nests with eggs we'd previously gathered, so we wouldn't risk the incubating eggs.

The first two hens refused to sit on the eggs. Okay, they were swapped out and we tested the remaining three.

Success! Deliciousaurus (hatched last year) and Uptown Bus, a 5 year old veteran broody hen who's raised chicks before, accepted the eggs.

By now it was full dark, so the test eggs were swapped out for the eggs from the incubator, each hen getting 11 eggs.

The power came back on three hours later, and once the ReptiPro had warmed up again, I gently took the incubating eggs from the hens and put them back in. Our two darling hero girls got a couple of other eggs to sit on the rest of the night.

We had no way of knowing if all this had harmed the embryos, but figured we'd had our Chickam Drama for the year (because there's always something).

But the very next day, while my husband was doing the 2PM egg turn both racks in the ReptiPro collapsed. Eggs, hygrometers, racks--everything came crashing down.He did his best to catch everything, I ran out there and we carefully removed the eggs & reset the racks, hygrometers & eggs. He doesn't know how it happened. 

I checked the eggs with a flashlight and only found one that was cracked--but that one VERY badly, I doubted it would survive. It was a BAD fall, all of the eggs took a heavy tumble so it's entirely possible we'd end up with a zero hatch rate. At 15 days into their 21 day incubation the eggs are roughly half yolk, half chick. 

The badly cracked egg is #8 (unknown mother), and there was some blood seepage from one crack. I doubted the chick would survive, but as an experiment decided to give the chick a shot. These pictures show the cracks (the egg was profoundly damaged, not all of the cracks show in the pictures).

Away I flew to the Internet for help. I knew I only had a few minutes and because of previous egg repair failures, had an idea how I wanted to repair the egg, but got confirmation online. Following instructions from this poultry abstract online, repaired them using Micropore Surgical Tape--paper (not cloth!) medical tape and clear school/craft glue (wax doesn't work). 

I had to work quickly before the egg cooled too much. Using a bit of paper towel, I gently wiped the cracks with peroxide, then dried them with another paper towel before applying the tape. The paper tape is slightly sticky on one side, just the right amount it seems, because it stuck well to the dry eggshell. I braced the egg sideways in an egg carton while I worked. Paper tape in place:

 ...and then painted the tape with a thin layer of the glue. I waited for 1-2 minutes for the glue to dry, then returned the egg to the incubator.

I decided that if this egg or any of the others start to look or smell bad, I'd pull them. But after all this, if ANY of this year's eggs hatched it'll be a miracle.

On day 18 of incubation we stopped turning the eggs and moved them down to the bottom of the incubator to hatch. The repaired #8 cracked egg is on the right, in front.

 As usual, two days before the official hatch day, the bantam eggs pipped and began to hatch. More eggs followed suit...even #8, the repaired egg! I may have lucked out here due to the stage the chick was at when the egg got cracked (day 15)--any earlier in incubation, and the chick may have died.

Of the 22 eggs, 10 chicks hatched--a HUGE improvement in previous years (and the big reason for moving Chickam for a mid-May hatch date in the future!). For daddys, we have four roosters: Bacon, a tiny bantam, Bobbie, a buff Brahma, Mjolnir, a buff Orpington, and Eggroll, a blue laced red Wyandotte. All of the roos except Bacon are BIG boys.

On hatch day we had an Extreme Heat Warning from the weather service (because what the heck, throw in another hurdle, fate!), temps inside the ReptiPro were spiking so I had to bring a fan into the roon the incubator was in.

But the brooder box was right next to it.

This was a problem, because drafts can kill new chicks. So we once again recruited Uptown Bus for our Chickam mom this year! Here she is with her first two chicks, we gave her more chicks as they dried out and got strong after hatching. She quickly realized what the incubator was all about, and watched it like a hawk for new hatches, then being very vocal about I WANT THAT CHICK.

We ended up with 10 chicks: 5 bantams and 5 standard-size. Their moms are listed when known, and certain chicks got either a colored leg band or a food color spot so we can tell them apart from their dopplegangers.

So in order of hatch, here are this year's Chickam chicks! 

For the Rapunzel chicks I suspect Bacon the bantam roo will be dad...Swiffer was a bigger hen, so the big boys may have successfully gotten with her. Time will tell!

Big Cluckin' McGuckin (#26, a Swiffer bantam egg), with her white leg band. McGuckin had to be restrained from running off during picture time. As of 6/15, her leg band got too tight. We removed it, she now was a green food color spot on her back & chest.

 Blaziken, (#24, a bantam) with a blue leg band.

Big Nasty (28, a Swiffer bantam egg). Swiffer's chicks tend to be fluffier, with shorter, heavily feathered shanks.

Mammon (25, a Rapunzel bantam egg).

Mammon has an interesting pattern on the top of her head.

Grug! (#17, Dubious Intentions egg, clean-legged). Grug! is very sweet and climbs into your hand if you reach into the brooder box.

Sticky (#8, repaired cracked egg, clean-legged). That's right, to everyone's amazement, that badly damaged egg hatched, and with NO help from us! Turns out from her elaborate markings of a chipmunk backstripe and Egyptian eyeliner, Sticky has one of our Americaunas hens for a mom--either Peanut or Cheese. Sticky is very healthy and perky, and earned her name--of course--from the tape her shell was held together with..

With the repair of Sticky's egg, I did my best to eyeball the zone where most eggs pipped, and avoid it...and it looks like it worked. Again, I got lucky with where the cracks ran. Although I'm willing to bet Sticky would have forced her way out of that egg regardless.

 Here is Sticky's spent shell:

 

Takoyaki (#15, clean-legged). A very pretty chick, most likely from one of our black hens.

Owl (#27, a Swiffer egg). Owl has a yellow leg band. As of 6/16, her leg band also got too tight--these Swiffer chicks have legs like tree trunks!. We removed it, she now was a blue food color spot on her back & chest.

Thunderfuss (#18, possibly an egg from Imminent Disaster?, clean-legged). Thunderfuss has a green food color spot on her back and on her head.

Snack (#5, Bort Grungus egg, clean-legged) Snack has a blue food color spot on her back and head. Snack had LOTS to say during picture time.

So there they are! No feed store chicks this year, all of them are from our own flock!

The cam will run 24/7, with sound, for the next 8 weeks. You can watch it on our Jack's Henhouse YouTube channel, here:  Chickam 2024