Cheryl,
treatable, the magic word. I am pulling for you.
OK, excuse this but I need somewhere to freak out today. Firefly my new little silkie pullet was dead this morning. NO signs, she has been quiet and in quarantine. The other girl looks OK right now, but I am FREAKING out. She is off to Davis this morning, so that is 10 days to 3 weeks of waiting.
She was in quarantine, but I don't practice great bio-security. They are in the garage in their own pen, but the broody is in the garage too Different pen and no shared floor or feed or anything but would breath some of the same air. I feed all them and don't take my shoes or clothes off to go in the backyard. The food has been completely separate since it has only been 4-5 days since they got there.
I have never had a older girl die that was not a predator or sick beforehand. And now I wonder, do I tell the lady I got them from, or do I wait for the report? She is a BYC girl, her runs were clean, her chickens well taken care of, everyone fat and happy. I hate to freak her out too when I don't know what it is, but I wonder if she should know anyway.
Now I have a single girl in quarantine alone. I hate to leave her in solitary for so long, ugg. After I found her I was so upset I threw up, my stomach is still in knots. Im going to fumagate teh cage in a few minutes for the poor little girl that is left. She seems healthy and happy too.
Of course, it was the chicken who reminded me of little purples. Even the same breeder.
Oh no, that was the beautiful blue partridge Silkie, right? I am so sorry, she sounded beautiful
I see later on you said she wasn't eating, maybe the change caused stress and brought out whatever killed her. I have two newbie silkies here now, but I have seen both of them eat and drink. I sure hope you find out what happened. Are you going to leave the other one in quarantine until you get the report?
I would also tell the person you got her from, I would want to know if that ever happened with any birds I gave away.
Does anyone want me to bring BSF larvae to stockton? They are semi dormant right now, not maturing, so you would have time to build a pod. We moved our pod into the garage to keep them safe from frost.
I would love some. I noticed they just showed up in some of my runs this last summer (next door neighbor shows rabbits, so she may have started them in her barn). Can't be too many in my opinion, even if they do look scary!
Chook, I have 4 quail chicklits for you, they are from the NYD hatch. Italian buff( now that I think of it, that should be a f1 tux the only mature roo was a f1 tibetian, what I think is a tux, and what I think are 2 roux/Tibetan f1 tux crosses. I had a gold hen and a roux hen laying in the garage and stuck the eggs in the incubator. Unless you got quails from deb and are good. Wiggles and Gimpy were also victims Off a 5 year old ninja, Little girl wanted her daddy to get the owie quail to live on dirt and wire. His setting checked out as good for her so she went home with them. I'm a sucker for little kids.
I'd like to add in a couple of tibetans or get some tibetan eggs. I only hatched one initially and he had a funky neck. I'd also like tuxedos.
Are we thinking of meeting up on Saturday? I know last years BYC meeting was then, not sure what is up, the Stockton thread is more mellow this year.
I'm up for this for sure, although I have trouble tearing away while they are judging. I tend to follow along in the next row over so I can hear.
I have not had a problem with nekkid headed girls since I replaced my roo. Not that the old ones were agressive, but strange feather is very gentle, and his brothers seem to be as well. Gordo was so big I think he fell off if he didn't get a grip. And the Tibetian boy was flighty and liked to chase ( and had bad swimmers) There are secondary roos in the pens too, but they seem to take their que from the main guy.
Deb, Ill see if I can get that group laying. Its a t1 roo over white and tibetian hens ( some of those hens are t1 as well) . So i got a mix of chicks. I'll put lights in there when get back from fed ex. MY old tib roo was not very fertile, took me a while to figure that out, so we got few of those guys to hatch untill we put teh new t1's in there. Now he and strangefeather are fertile little daddies.
I should have BBS silkie eggs for trading too, one showgirl hen. For some reason beknownst only to the genetic gods I get some partridge from these guys. It is one of the showgirls that is sneaking it in, but i dunno who or how, none of them show partridge.
I am thinking about going the no vaccine route. I lost 2 chickens to Marek's this past year. One was a 1 1/2 yr old hen who had been vaccinated at the hatchery and the other was a young cockerel who was not vaccinated as a chick. The cockerel came down with symptoms first but the hen may have had it first. I sent her in to Davis and the report came back that she was full of cancer. That was in June and I haven't had another one come down with it since then.
You both mentioned Mareks and Cancer. I think I am confused. I did not think Mareks was a form of cancer. I always thought Mareks was a form of Herpes that developed turmors along the spinal cord which is what caused the paralysis. Is Mareks a type of viral cancer?
Deb, Ill see if I can get that group laying. Its a t1 roo over white and tibetian hens ( some of those hens are t1 as well) . So i got a mix of chicks. I'll put lights in there when get back from fed ex. MY old tib roo was not very fertile, took me a while to figure that out, so we got few of those guys to hatch untill we put teh new t1's in there. Now he and strangefeather are fertile little daddies.
I should have BBS silkie eggs for trading too, one showgirl hen. For some reason beknownst only to the genetic gods I get some partridge from these guys. It is one of the showgirls that is sneaking it in, but i dunno who or how, none of them show partridge.
Since my infatuation with partridge Silkies I have been devouring the Partridge Silkies thread, and I have seen references to "redneck" silkies. From what I have been reading these are black birds that have red leakage on their necks - they apparently can throw the partridge coloring due to the pattern gene (Pg) they carry. Since you have showgirls.. no neck feathers... but maybe you can see some other colors showing up in the crest or just below the neck that would give you a hint as to who is doing it.. and then I will take them...
UCD just published a paper about a virus that causes brain tumors in raccoons.
It seems a lot of cancers are caused by viruses.
Oral cancer has been on the rise for years due to the HPV virus.
Yes, HPV in humans is associated with a lot of cancers. The different strains of the virus cause different cancers it seems. Since Mareks is chicken herpes, it makes sense.
Health update for my dear friends that have really hung in there with me this very hard year....
Larry & I went to a new neurologist/pain specialist yesterday and she was amazing. I actually burst into tears when she said my condition is treatable and I can be fixed.
Not completely conclusive, still awaiting some xrays, but apparently the fall I took last January is causing instability and some damage in my low back & tail bone disc that have been pushing on my nerves and that's why I'm in constant pain. Currently diagnosed as Lumboscaral radiculopathy, a condition caused by compression of the nerves in the spine. I had 2 of my low back discs fused in 2003 so the lessened mobility of those 2 discs has added in this problem.
I've started a bit of a different treatment of pain meds & prednisone short term with physical therapy starting hopefully this week. After the xrays come in within the next few days, we'll know if surgery is a better route, which is perfectly fine with me if needed. I just can't be in pain anymore.
I'm a cripple now, like a 95 year old woman. BUT am confident and very hopeful now that this new Dr. is going to get me cured with even a stronger sense of becoming healthy! Too much life still needing to be lived!
Still selling all my breeding flocks (I've been so lucky to find wonderful wonderful homes for all me flocks!) and will be continuing to keep my pretty ladies (way too many at this point.. BTW) in the backyard. Getting down the stairs to see them daily is still going to be hard, but I can't live without them.
Thanks everyone for your caring emails, PMs etc. It's so nice to know I have so many friends out there.
