ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, June 2, 1996 TAG: 9606030017
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-5 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: GRETNA (AP)
SOURCE: MARK THOMAS DANVILLE REGISTER & BEE
BOYD AYERS has kept pythons, a tarantula, pheasants, llamas, peacocks, ostriches and emus on his farm over the years. What next? Maybe a monkey or camel, he says.
Boyd Ayers recalls walking to the barn at four in the morning to milk seven cows, taking a kerosene lantern with him to light the way.
It was one of the daily chores for Ayers while growing up on a Bedford County farm, where chickens, turkeys and hogs roamed, and fields of tobacco and corn grew in the sun.
Standing in the yard of his home, sunglasses and a blue American Legion cap shading his eyes from the late afternoon sun, Ayers, now 50, remembers thinking as a boy how he never wanted to milk another cow once he grew up. He wasn't exactly enamored with farm work as a child.
A person's thinking, however, sometimes changes. Ayers now says farm work is a good way of teaching children responsibility.
Ayers, who works on-air at radio station WMNA and works at Chesapeake Corp., among other jobs, is also still on the farm, though his livestock is a bit unusual.
This man, who lives west of Gretna in the Brights community, has been involved with exotic animals for 20 years. Birds are his thing now.
In pens near his house, he has four ostriches, 10 emus and nine rheas. More of his emus live in Bedford.
Ayers also has tropical birds and has recently added some black and white Japanese goldfish to the roster.
Over the years, Ayers has kept pythons and other snakes, a monitor (large lizard), a tarantula, pheasants, llamas and peacocks. In addition, he's had more traditional farm animals - cows, donkeys, chickens and horses.
``It's just a fascination. ... I would see it in a zoo, and I knew people raised them. ... I'd say, 'If they can do it, I can.'''
Having nondomestic animals also gives Ayers, a former paratrooper, a chance to educate people, especially children.
``So many people are afraid of exotic animals. ... You've just got to know how to handle them.'' Ayers admits being bitten by a python, but says it was his fault, not the reptile's.
School children have visited to see Ayers' animals, and he has taken the animals on the road for shows. He doesn't do that as much now - he just doesn't have the time. Ayers has four jobs, besides the animals.
Exotic birds are his main interest now. Ayers' wife, Geraldine, does the feeding.
The black, gray and white ostriches, two male and two female, could live to be 40. Ayers says they could reach 350 pounds and stand as tall as 8 feet on their long, spindly legs.
The emus, with gray feathers and blue around the neck, will grow to 125-140 pounds, and the white and gray rheas will weigh 75-100.
Ayers uses the birds for a breeding operation. He also is looking at using them for meat. He says all three have a red meat that's low in fat and cholesterol.
He says oil from the birds can be put in cosmetics and pharmaceuticals, while the skin can be used for leather and the feathers for dusters.
So what exotic animal will next find a home at the Brights' ``zoo''?
Ayers says he wants a monkey to carry on his shoulder. He also has been thinking about camels.
``Once you grow up on a farm, it never leaves you.''
LENGTH: Medium: 72 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: TRISH BUNTON/Danville Register & Bee. Boyd Ayers patsby CNBone of the four ostriches he raises on his farm in the Pittslyvania
County community of Brights May 23. These birds could live to age
40, he says.