Chickens for 10-20 years or more? Pull up a rockin' chair and lay some wisdom on us!

[Back2MyRoots]

Another of our girls, a 21 week old, has a severe wry tail (I posted earlier and elsewhere about it) but since we aren't planning on breeding, there is no reason to cull- she has a regal, mellow quiet disposition, and all the others like her. She also has been a mediator, getting in between when others squabble.

What's wry tail? I have a hen that has the most jacked-up looking tail and all the feathers on her neck are wonky looking too! Her tail feathers grow in a circle and curl all over forty creations and her neck feathers all grow with a sort of swoosh to the side. She's not breed stock or anything. And my huband LOVES it---he says she has personality (I say sure she does. Like Hatchet-Face on the movie Cry Baby!)

 

[Mountain Momma]

I can't imagine any wise person culling for poor feathering during molt. Not really a good example and nor have we ever gave that advice.

Well, I think that particular bird looks bad but I also think she has spirit. In the oulander blogs, before BYC for me, a lot of people have noticed that the imperfect birds in their flock have other qualities that are superior. More adaptable, more social, best brooder, etc. So I am still on the fence. When I inherited the chicken with the deformed legs/feet I was astonished at how the rest of her "Cori's kitchen" flock babied her. It gave me a huge insight into the way these birds are and that they have sensitivity to each other. She had a constant companion and none of my other chickens ever pecked her. Her little parade stayed with her and missed out on really great chicken stuff just to be with her.
When she died, I was a little sad because in the few weeks we had her she stood out. She tried to brood a pile of eggs and pecked me so hard I have a scar, (when I tried to reach under her), she was confident when I put her outside, she demanded her own respect. I have a very young PR that has been trying to sit eggs and she pecked me today and it was so soft and timid, like a baby birp.
My little old crooked leg, princess Diana, was a fighter and she lived her whole life in squallor and then less than a month in a regular chicken world she died.
She was looked up to by the other chickens and maybe she was the oldest of the bunch but she wasnt low on the totem at all. Another chicken sang to her, even the roosters were hanging near her at the end. I know all of this might seem like me being all weird and sentimentalizing but my roosters are my original flock and they were near her that last day all day long. They hardly knew her.
(Sorry, I just heard my son tell my husband that if he check mates him one more time he'll quit.)
Her little parade of friends, for lack of a better word, are now out and about with all of the others. The one with the bald head is definitely a survivor. She got an apple today and was fierce to eat it alone. Her head feathers are finally coming back in, yeah! And the other one is more subdued but still a rank holder in the flock. These arent the land of misfit toy chickens they are worthy chicken spirits in imperfect bodies and they carry on. I think at the end of the day, for me, a chicken population is like a human one and the imperfections are the interesting parts of them and how the others deal with it is fascinating and maybe makes them all better for having known each other.
Of course this is silly but if you have the time and money is 2nd or third or lower on the list what is the harm in taking a little special care of an unusual spirit among a flock of darlings?
I havent really confessed to the following here yet but I do have a friend (lol) and she has had a sick chicken for a month. It laid a monster egg and then all heck broke loose. Blood, pecking, feather loss, cracked and cemented opening, not eating. All bad. I have a nice utility sink so I invited her to come over and bathe her sick chicken. We have bathed her I think 5 or 6 times now. She has been in a large kennel in her coop seperated and she has also been allowed in the yard without the other chickens. She has been living off of grass for a couple weeks. She wont eat regular food. My friend gave her general antibiotics a few times but I honestly thought she was a gonner from day one. We bathed her in organic puppy shampoo, soaked her in olive oil, at one point her discharge turned cement like and we used DAWN dish soap. We poured hydrogen peroxide on her area. We did everything we read about. Over and over again. Her discharge has been like a yolk for weeks. Somethimes like cement.
Anyway, Lord am I wordy, She is on the mend. Last week her area looked healthy for the first time, no scabs etc. This week her poo looks healthy and she started eating regular food again. Her feathers are growing back. We plan to bathe her her again on Sat if it is warm and then re-enter the flock next week. The whole time her eyes have been bright. She is an EE or Americauna and she is very pretty and my friend's sons' chicken. He is 6. These are the reasons we went to the trouble I think. It didnt cost money though because my friend had the antibiotics already and we just tried with plain old time and soap.
It was gross. It was smelly. It was sometimes surreal. My friend jokes that I am the only one she knows that would touch her chickens hootchy cootchy. lol. So I dont know what makes you fight for a chicken, its probably different for everyone, but I think at some point it will dawn on me why on earth I would fight for a chicken's life.

 

[Gargoyle]

What's wry tail? I have a hen that has the most jacked-up looking tail and all the feathers on her neck are wonky looking too! Her tail feathers grow in a circle and curl all over forty creations and her neck feathers all grow with a sort of swoosh to the side.

Here's the thread with pix on my wry tail hen- from what people say it's a pretty extreme case.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/714154/pullet-has-a-bent-tail

Could yours just be a frizzy?

 

[Mountain Momma]

Here's the thread with pix on my wry tail hen- from what people say it's a pretty extreme case.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/714154/pullet-has-a-bent-tail

Could yours just be a frizzy?

She is lovely. Shemakes me want to get some Columbian Wyondottes.I bet it make the roosters job easy!

 

[Beekissed]

Quote:
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Maybe this is why? You feel they are human?

 

[Gargoyle]

She is lovely. Shemakes me want to get some Columbian Wyondottes.I bet it make the roosters job easy!

The vent turns a bit with the tail, so it might put his aim off. (I believe the problem is a twist at the last vertebra) That's also why I'm watching carefully for when she starts laying, hoping she doesn't get egg bound.

BTW, note her comb, a purebred Columbian Wyandotte has a rose comb. Two of our five pretty much meet fit the standard, two of them have this single comb, and the splay legged girl has mossy, almost laced, feathering.

 

[Back2MyRoots]

Here's the thread with pix on my wry tail hen- from what people say it's a pretty extreme case.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/714154/pullet-has-a-bent-tail

Could yours just be a frizzy?

She's not a frizzy. She's be soooo much more atractive if she was!

I am tellin ya, she has a BAD case of the Can't-Help-Its!! I will see if I either have or can take her pic, just so you can see. She's soooo odd looking!

 

[Mountain Momma]

Maybe this is why? You feel they are human?

I dont really know. I think my ability to consider animals human has waned since I got a Lab and a Retriever. Back in the Day when we had Pyrenees and Aussies I certainly did. But now I think
I just consider them (dogs with no brain and no bravery) an echo of human. Like a reminder or a shadow. Or maybe the chickens are so much smarter and more i nteresting than the dogs in my life right now I just put all that emotional energy on them instead. Poor chickens, watching me watching them with a glass of wine and a lettuce heart. Someone should have warned me about Retrievers. Honestly.

 

[Beekissed]

I love Labs!! Mine have been the most intelligent, worthy and wonderful dogs...

 

[bruceh]

To flip the flock before first moult is indeed something that makes sense to a lot of flocks that are kept for eggs, eggs and more eggs. A top laying strain, like a commercial Red Sex Link, hatched in March might begin laying by August 1st. These layers will produce roughly 300 eggs their first pullet year, sometimes even 310 eggs. But, by the next autumn, there is a moult coming. There is a decision to be made. Keep them, feed them through the 4-6 week re-feathering or just flip the birds. The new year's pullet crop is in full lay, so in the industry, flipping the flock just before first moult is actually quite common.

Here's what we do. We are selective. We do evaluate the birds and some get sold off, but not all. Some of the birds will be kept for a second laying season. These are not meat birds, as they have virtually no meat on their bones. These aren't heritage birds. These birds don't even breed true. These are layers. Yes, these birds are kept for eggs, not to be redundant, but it's true. They are often "lit" by their keepers during winter months to keep going. There is another sobering reality is that many of these high flying, high output super layers do in fact suffer from internal laying and other "burn out" issues. Keeping them for a second or even a third season brings these risks to the fore.

If breaking even or perhaps making a few bucks in the small holdings egg biz is one's game, all these things get factored into the equation. There is virtually nothing of the "pet" philosophy that enters into one's equation.

Before you think me hard nosed, please remember that I can mentally separate the "eggers" from my "pets" (yes, I have a couple I am affectionate about) and my heritage birds, which are a different ball of wax altogether. Totally different criteria is applied to those in figuring the economic equation.

bravo