Recent content by MoreCowdog

Thanks so much for your replies and advice. Here's a little more info on what's been happening: Lucy has been to the vet a couple times. When I first took her in she was limping with no obvious injury. After the first visit she was diagnosed with a respiratory infection and given antibiotics...

Thanks for your reply 0wen. It sounds like it's best to wait and see what happens with Lucy (last surviving bird) before moving forward with new chickens. As you mentioned, I'll give the coop a thorough cleaning. The design of the garden ark allows for pretty good ventilation. If you're not...

Hi everyone, Over the last few weeks my 3 silkies have been dropping off due to an illness that bears a strong resemblance to Mareks. These birds were my first chickens, and in the few months that I had them, I feel I provided adequate shelter, food, clean water, regular vitamin supplements...

Thanks again for your help! They are still hanging in there - I will up the supplement frequency. Didn't realize that Riboflavin was B2.

Thanks for your reply Wyorp Rock! I am posting the label from the supplement. It has a B-12 supplement but not B-2 as mentioned in the Mareks article you linked to. Getting a B-2 supplement may offer some benefits. The vet's assessment of neurological issues was related to her observations of...

Hi everyone, I am writing about my sick silkie pullet and roo. They are both about 6 to 7 months old. Hopefully this isn't too long, thanks for reading. I originally bought 4 chicks from someone in our area who had an ad on Craigslist, one of which started crowing so he stayed at my surrogate...

Thanks for asking - things are pretty much the same...it seems they are fine with going down, and they still aren't going up. I am thinking of re-doing the ramp and adding a second section to it to make it less steep. For now, I put them to bed at night in the roosting box. If anything changes...

Today I was watching the girls trying to hop up a mere few inches (to the top of the door frame on the coop) and for the amount of effort and wing flapping that they put into it, it's not surprising that they haven't mastered going up the ramp yet.

Well the girls were all sleeping outside again when I came home from work this evening, so they know how to go down the ramp, but not up. I put them back inside again. Hopefully after a few days they will start to catch on! I may try bribing them with mealworms on each of the rungs to try and...

Thanks for the replies and welcome everyone! Well I'm pleased to report that sometime this morning while I was gone at work they seemed to figure out how to use the ramp on their own!! The next trick will be seeing if they put themselves in at night tonight too! They grow up so fast...here...

Thank you! Appreciate your help and writing back! There are ridges on the ramp about 5-1/2" or 6" apart, you may be able to make them out in the first photo. The roost box is mostly outdoor ambient temperature (Seattle, WA) it ranges from about high 30s to low 50s this time of year. I got one of...

Hi everyone, It's taken a long while from deciding to get chickens to finally get to this point. Over the summer my girlfriend's dad and I built a Garden Ark coop, and in mid-October I purchased 4 silkie chicks that were a few weeks old. They were raised by a friend of mine who has a good...