I personally believe that I can't protect my chickens from larger predators such as raccoons, predatory birds and weasels at the same time. I would have to have them in a box.
Vet just texted. It's a sebaceous carcinoma on the base of the horns so rare that they don't know what the expected behavior is but likely that it has already spread to her lungs. We can't do anything but monitor her for quality of life. I shouldn't be surprised. We don't even really know...
That is very reassuring. We lost her true sister to a mysterious thing that swept in and took her in three days from the time she stopped eating to the time she passed. I suspect it was bladder cancer so I'm sensitive to any issues in case whatever that was is genetic. We count ourselves very...
Thank you. I was finally able to get ahold of my vet and she suggested the same thing but thinks Louise ripped off the cover of her scur. It's really good to know about the scent gland though because she was coughing and kind of gagging after I put the neosporin on yesterday and did it again...
We found this on our dwarf goat Louise this afternoon. It appears to be a bubble of some kind that burst next to a scur. She didn't even seem to notice it and was eating as usual. We handle her twice a day so this was very strange. Louise is 12 or 13 years old now and has never had any...
Thank you, thank you! I cannot believe that this bird is up and running. I swear we thought he had died about five times. We had given him another two days before we put him out of his misery but look at him now!
Yes, initially. It has been about 15 hours since the attack. The blood has clotted well. I'm torn between disturbing and handling him (too much?) and just leaving him alone to heal. I have a B12 laced water bowl in there with him.
My flock has been under attack and I lost most of them in one night. Put the remaining hens in the basement. Fast forward and I put two roosters out with soooo many traps around the property and one was attacked. I put him in the basement in a dog crate and have been giving him B12 and CBD...
There is a two inch gap between the sheet of plastic over the roof and the continuous sheet that I wrap around the sides. On warmer days above 30 F, I open up one side to air everything out.
I use two Producer's Pride Defender coops together for my garden to protect my plants from deer and other wildlife. When it gets cold, I wrap the whole thing in greenhouse plastic which raises the temperature 10-20 F. This year, when it got too cold for plants and the coop I actually use for...
I bought twelve chicks that were supposed to be pullets but it turned out to be a straight run. One of the pullets was very very quiet from day one. She wasn't completely inactive but was separate from everyone else for days. We kept them in the living room for a couple of months and they are...
We had the same problem when my mother in law killed all of the snakes on the property. She could not stand them. I kept trying to move them away from the house but we eventually did wind up with a rodent problem. She has since passed and our gopher and garter snakes are coming back but it's...
Thank you. I have always understood that they were!
With the bear spray, yes. Wear a mask and safety goggles while doing this in case the wind shifts direction. I spray toward the offenders if I catch them in my yard which is really effective. They hate the smell. I must be some kind of...
In addition to what's listed, i use welded wire kennels and coops wrapped in chicken wire for runs around my coops so that predators can't reach in and grab a bird, plant mint and use peppermint oil soaked paper towels as a rodent deterrent (raccoons are rodents) when I see them sniffing around...
Any time I see something that looks like failure to thrive I put the bird in a kennel in our living room and constantly observe her / his behavior. We have a quiet home without other animals at this point so this might not be for everyone. I like to see how often the bird moves, how often it...
That's a lot. If I was looking for a 10' x 6', I would buy a 10' x 10' x 6'(H) welded wire kennel with roof and enclose half of it with roosts and nesting boxes. We have a lot of large predators and wood chucks so we're all about the metal frame.