My Barred Rock hen has looked bad with severe feather loss for the past few months. The others look fine. I've dusted her with kitten flea powder (vet's recommendation) and the area with DE. Some of her bare patches are bright red and today I noticed an open sore on her back. She's still...
I took my bantam Cochin to the vet yesterday because she's been having a hard time walking and even standing without losing her balance. My vet suspects a Vitamin D problem caused by the layer pellets. Purina recently recalled their layer pellets due to a Vitamin D deficiency...
Last week, I noticed that my 2-year-old bantam Cochin had large balls of mud/poop hanging from the feathers between her legs. I cut them off and washed her bottom. Even with the balls of poop gone now, she walks like she's still has something between her legs and moves very slowly. She has...
My family and I attended the Boston Poultry Show a couple of weeks ago (our first real chicken show other than at the fair) and were amazed to see all the ginormous chickens there. They are categorized as Large Fowl, yet I've never seen a mention of anything but standard or bantam when I...
I posted several days ago about my Silkie hen being used to incubate my friend's pheasant eggs for the first time. I tried to candle today (10 days) and can't see anything but darkness. I'm using a small mag light in complete dark. Can anyone tell me if I'm trying too soon or are pheasant too...
I just have chickens, but a friend who has pheasants wanted to see if my silkie (who is very broody right now) could hatch some eggs for her. Has anyone ever tried this with any luck or am I just wasting my silkie's time? We put 8 pheasant eggs under her this afternoon and she seems content.
I'm not talking about small, I'm talking about quail-sized. I found it under my Silkie and at first assumed it came from her as a second egg for the day. She had already laid an egg first thing in the morning. However, she's broody and could just be sitting on someone else's egg. Also, it's...
I just watched the movie "The Last Station" last night. It takes place in Russia in the early 1900's. I noticed these chickens running around which looked like solid black Brahmas, but can't find such a color listed for the Brahma. The hens looked large and had fully feathered feet, solid...
When we were having our hot days here in Connecticut, I understood why my 7 girls slowed down production to 2-3 eggs per day. Now it's between 75 and 80 and they aren't any better. Yesterday was sunny, in the 70's, no humidity and absolutely NO eggs. They've been moulting, but not bad...
I thought I was going to lose my 5-week-old Silkie this morning, but now she seems fine and is acting normally. She kept putting her head to her chest and didn't seem to be able to hold her head correctly. This position seems to have caused her to somersault a lot. She rolled and flopped all...
I sold a couple of hens (and my cranky roo) on Craigs List and now just have six-hens-a-laying. This has prompted me to try to identify which hen lays which egg now that I can tell my two remaining Silver Spangled Hamburgs apart. FYI, "Righty" is a Hamburg whose tail leans to the right so...
My Silver Spangled Hamburg roo has recently started getting aggressive. He's 7 months old and follows me around like he's after me, but only bites occasionally at shoes or pants. He used to be a lot more timid. I know Hamburgs aren't known for being very sociable, but is there anything I...
This question has a different perspective to it but I think this is the best place to ask. I'm a newbie and just got my first egg. Yay! We also have an unintentional cockeral with our 8 pullets. My 14-year-old daughter is concerned about eating our eggs because she's afraid they're fertilized...
I have 5 Silver Spangled Hamburgs and 4 EE's. My coop is the bottom half of a children's wooden swingset fort. The upper fort part is still available for kids to climb on. At night, most of the chickens go into the coop to roost, but lately my Hamburg rooster and one of the Hamburg hens keep...
I currently have 12-week-old pullets and one cockeral who was supposed to be a girl. 4 are EE's and 5 are SSH. I want to add a few more exotic looking or different breeds at the end of September (I'm traveling too much in Sept. to do it before then).
I got my current birds from the Meyers...
I have eight 16-week-old pullets and 1 cockeral, 4 are EE's and 5 are Hamburg's. They will approach me to see if I have food and occasionally try to follow if I've just fed them a treat. Other than that, they are very nervous around people. The only way I can hold one is by catching it in the...
I had been there about 2 hours before for quite a while observing them; everything seemed fine. At first I thought she was sleeping, but she's gone. Other than she has white poop on her butt, I have now idea what happened. I don't know if she pasted up (but I had checked them all this...