I lowered the temperature to 60 and will adjust every two days. We hit back in the 20 degrees during the night. I did notice our weather is jumping to 40 degrees at night and almost 60 degrees this weekend. Do you think she will be okay putting in the pen this weekend. I did notice she was hugging the side of the pen closest to the heat, as I did lower the heat.
I did take her to coop with other two chickens today. She is such an awesome trooper. She loved it being with them. There was no attacking and all getting along. I was out there for an hour., still doing the check of any openings on the roof. All good being over perinoid, used lots of zip ties, security safety. I brought her back to her dog cage and she did go to a place for heat. That is why I am trying to get her use to the current weather but am happy the warmer weather coming in this weekend.
Today, Thursday is a very sunny day and warm. I decided to put Spots with the other two chickens and give her a day, with them. I am nervous about this as I am not there to supervise. Since yesterday went so well I decided to try it out. Hopefully all goes well. I am going to grab her and bring back for the night. I am kind of concern as she loves dust bath and might try this. She has ointment on the back of her head which the dirt might stick to. Again, I am being overly cautious. I guess if she gets dirt on her head, I will clean up with soupy water, if happens.
OMG, I went and grabbed her at the end of the day. Her head was covered in dirt. I was like Oh I should have known better. I actually washed her head off to best I could. The ointment is not friendly to remove. I looked at her this morning and her head looks good of dirt but her feathers below her head where the ointment went looks pretty dirty. I guess when she molts this fall will clean this up. The ointment is not easy to get off. My husband thinks the dirt is good for her and she should be fine. I don't know if I made a mistake putting her out there so soon. Planning on returning her in the coop this weekend as we have 60-degree weather coming. Hopefully she doesn't get an infection from the dirt. Her head appears to have some type of protection after the dark blood fell off. She does still have a few spots of dark blood that didn't fall off yet. Your comment made me feel so much better. She has always been such a dirt bath bird I should have thought about this knowing her so well. Will just ride it out. I just think it is important to put her back in the coop.How did it go?
LOL No, Spots wouldn't dust bath and get dirt all in the ointment would she!!
I bet she does! Her scabs look to be fairly intact, so a spritzing of soapy water and little rinse may do as a cleanup.
I'm not laughing at you - I've been there done that. I had a hen pretty much scalped by a rooster. She was healing nicely so I put her in an empty pen so she'd be near her flock and not get picked at. I had just put her in there, filled water and feed, turned around and she was already wallowing around like a hog in the dirt. So much for that. Good news, she healed just fine, feathered in when I didn't think that was possible too. You can learn a lot from chickens.
This is kind off topic but want to add, when I put her in recovery, I had this cat scratcher in there made of condensed cardboard. She just loved this to wipe her beak on. I guess since she didn't have ground to do this. When I moved her into the dog crate, I also put this in there for her. She used it all the time, to wipe her beak on. Just to let if you have this and penning your chicken, I recommend putting this in the area for this usage. Makes sense as they do not have hard ground to do this.
When I went out today, to check on her. She was actually grooming her neck feathers. So she might just clean herself up.
