I've had great advice from folks here about Aster, my hen who was attacked by a raccoon on Sunday night. Here's what we've done for her so far:
removed her from the flock
she's in the garage in a tall cardboard box with pine shavings
cleaned head wound (punctures, superficial scrapes) with...
So - thanks so much for the advice on the other thread I posted last night. Aster is still hanging in there, although she is just sitting, and is not interested in water or yogurt. I suppose that's because she's still in shock? I went out and bought antibiotics and Blue Kote from the Agway. The...
Got home tonight after a b'day BBQ - hadn't secured the pop-up door that leads from the coop run out into the larger extended yard. Heard screeching from the hen house, ran back, husband opened the egg door and was looking eye - to - eye at a racoon. A BIG raccoon.
He chased the thing out of...
This is our first spring with our chickens. We have 7 hens, no roosters: 3 plymouth rocks; 4 cochins. We have a fairly secluded and big back yard - and many people have said (and these are "chicken folks")...."Oh, just let them out and they will come back to the coop in the evening.". We've been...
I have 7 hens: 4 cochins and 3 plymouth rocks - all but one (a red cochin) have bare butts and feathers gone from the base of their tail. No blood, still laying and acting normal. My local Agway suggested that I seperate the one that is apparently doing this (the one that has all her feathers...
History: 3 Plymouth Rocks, 4 Cochins, born last May, all hens, no roosters. Getting 5/6 eggs everyday. All appear healthy, fed laying pellets, handful of scratch, table scraps, fresh water. They are living in the Taj Mahal of chicken coops too (pic below!). They have pine shavings in their hen...
After much reading, we decided that we needed to break our broody hen, Aster broodiness. We have no roosters and she's trying to hatch imaginary eggs - that will take FOREVER!
We do not have a dog or animal cage, but did have a dog pen in our garage and have set it up. DH was worried the...
Petunia is a barred cochin - one of our 7 seven month old hens. When she was 1 day old she came up lame - wouldn't even put weight on one foot. We built her a hospital room in brooder, gave her her own food/water and within 24 hrs she was flying over that hospital wall to rejoin her little...
So - yesterday my husband said that he thought one of the hens, Aster, was sick. He said she had been sitting in one of the nesting boxes all afternoon while he worked to cover the run with plastic (we had a blizzard here last night!)....i looked at her, reached underneath and found she was...
I just went out to give our chicks a treat (strawberries) and noticed that one of our (biggest) Plymouth Rock chicks' (about 8 wks old) tail is quivering - sort of looks like she's not doing it on purpose - that's it's involuntary....
This was the fastest growing chick and is visibly bigger...
UPDATE POSTED AT END OF THREAD...
This is our coop:
This is the Garden Coop design. As you can see, the henhouse is on the left - raised 3' off the ground, with a ramp up thru the floor. The entire coop is enclosed in 1/2" hardware cloth (sides,top), the hardware cloth is dug into the ground...
Our new chicks are in the coop and we are using their small waterer right now because the big ones are sold out at Agway - I've seen that ultra mod Eglu coop and they sell a nipple water dispenser that attaches to the side of the coop...(like a big version of a rabbit waterer, etc).....always a...
Our little flock is 6-7 weeks now - they were sexed "assorted feather legs" (from the local Agway). Are these cochins? Or what the breed it? And do you see all pullets here? They have the MOST soft feathers and are very sweet, gentle and friendly birds.
Here's hopin' they are girls!
THANKS...
Oh boy - our 5-6 week old babies are in our finished coop tonight! We put them in there this afternoon, and they were pretty surprised, flew around at each other........wouldn't go up the ladder to the hen house either.
So we placed all of them into the henhouse - about 30 mins later they had...
Our 7 "assorted feather legs" (cochins we think) and Plymouth Rocks are getting big (nearly 2 wks and 1 wk) FAST! We've read about using a pack & play for an interim brooder while the coop is being built. Got one from a freecycler today.
We wondered how people retrofit it for chicks? I've seen...
Hi folks -
I'm SUPER new here but thought I'd post this update on Petunia. Petunia is 5 days old, "assorted feather leg" (what does that mean anyways?), was fine til day 3 when she starting limping. She would put almost NO weight on the foot, and the toes were sort of curled in.
Yesterday...
Hi all -
I wrote this weekend about a little limping chick. I read a lot this weekend, and saw some threads that recommended giving the baby PolyViSol (without iron). So I got some and tried it - but it was hard and I wasn't sure if I did it right - she got some in there (I was using a...
We got 4 baby "assorted feather leg" babies on Friday and are getting 4 more Plymouth Rocks tomorrow.
Petunia, the fluffiest, cutest and sweetest chick (don't tell the other girls!!) is limping today. She seems to be the gentlest one of the bunch, but perhaps she is actually sick...?
I gave...
New chick mama here: 4 baby "assorted feather leg" babies on Friday, 4 more Plymouth Rocks tomorrow.
Petunia, (who looks like a baby penguin the kids think), the fluffiest and cutest one (don't tell the other girls) has gone from fairly normal/active to limping today. She seems to be the...
I posted a note this morning and several folks stepped right up and helped me. WHAT AN AWESOME PLACE!
We picked up our "assorted feather legs" yesterday - and have 3 more Plymouth Rocks coming on Monday. Does anyone know what kind of babies these might be? We LOVE them!
I'm going to try and...