Earlobes doing dark on silkie cross

[ChickenTenderKesha]

I have this pullet who has normally white earlobes but I noticed today they both had some brown spots. I’ll add some photos.

She’s recently been acting broody and screams when you try to reach anywhere near her when she’s in the nest. She does get off to eat and drink in the morning and I’ve had someone checking on her and kicking her off during the day once or twice when they go to collect eggs from the other coop to make sure she’s not just sitting in there all day. She stopped laying eggs after laying a really late one (compared to the day before) I want to say on Wednesday. So it’s her fourth day without an egg.

Thank for you help in advance!

 

[coach723]

Is she sitting on eggs? Are you letting her hatch some? If not it would be best to break her. She may be getting pecked by other birds that are trying to get her off the nest so they can use it. Some of them can be pretty determined to get the nest box that they want, and broodies can be pretty stubborn about not giving it up. I would either use a broody breaker crate to break her out of her broodiness, or I would separate her in a place that she can sit on her eggs undisturbed, if you are going to let her sit and hatch.

 

[ChickenTenderKesha]

Is she sitting on eggs? Are you letting her hatch some? If not it would be best to break her. She may be getting pecked by other birds that are trying to get her off the nest so they can use it. Some of them can be pretty determined to get the nest box that they want, and broodies can be pretty stubborn about not giving it up. I would either use a broody breaker crate to break her out of her broodiness, or I would separate her in a place that she can sit on her eggs undisturbed, if you are going to let her sit and hatch.

She’s the only one using the nest box in the coop she is in. There’s no other egg layers in there. She hasn’t been sitting on any eggs as they’ve always been collected daily and then she stopped laying I don’t have the room for her to hatch eggs either so I wouldn’t let her sit on them. I was hoping she would break herself after a few days but I think since she’s no longer free ranging with the main flock she’s more content to sit in the coop and actually go through with her being broody ??

I hadn’t thought about it before but I recall stepping on an egg that was on the floor of the main coop when she was still in there. I recall a day I saw three other pullets laying in each nest box preparing to give me some eggs but when I came back after a few hours all the eggs were moved into the one box..

She gets along well with the other two in her current coop and slept on the roost bar with them the first night but then after that she been in the nest box. They don’t bother her from what I can tell. The other two love their outdoor time more than anything so they rarely go back into the coop during the day.

The marks on her earlobes aren’t scabs either. It’s like her skin is changing colour from whiteish blue to brown

Edit: they aren’t scabs I fixed that

 

[Eggcessive]

Since the brown spots are on both earlobes, it is probably just some normal color bleeding into the white. I would place her in a wire dog crate with food/water and a low roost to break her from being broody. Otherwise, she may lose weight and could become ill. I have been blessed with a lot of broody hens, but they usually will break in about 5 days in a crate with no bedding. If they go back to the nest after 5 days, they go back to the crate.

 

[ChickenTenderKesha]

Since the brown spots are on both earlobes, it is probably just some normal color bleeding into the white. I would place her in a wire dog crate with food/water and a low roost to break her from being broody. Otherwise, she may lose weight and could become ill. I have been blessed with a lot of broody hens, but they usually will break in about 5 days in a crate with no bedding. If they go back to the nest after 5 days, they go back to the crate.

What size of crate would you suggest? I’d have to go out and get one..pigeons are in the only crate I have currently. But depending on size I can dual purpose it afterwards

 

[Eggcessive]

I have a hen right now just sleeping in a small wire crate. It is tight with her food and a coffee can secured to the side for water. That might be small for 24 hours a day, but mine gets out to roam around. A medium might be better, but a large would be big enough for 2 if needed. I put a tarp or something on top so a visitor doesn’t poop on their heads.

 

[coach723]

Here are some examples, make sure you raise it up off the ground so that air circulates all around her. I have several that are used for quarantine, broody breakers, integration, observation and hospital crates as needed. They come in very handy for all sorts of things. You can sometimes pick them up at yard sales or on craigs list for cheap.

 

[ChickenTenderKesha]

I ended up just buying a smaller one from TSC when I was grabbing a few other things there. I needed a smaller crate than the one I have for the dog. The one I got is 36”L X 23”W X 25”H. It’s got plenty of room for her, food,water, and a low perch. I didn’t get to lift it off the floor tonight but I pushed any bedding away from under it so it’s sitting on the actual floor. She was on the low roost when I left her

 

[ChickenTenderKesha]

I’ll do what I see in those photos tomorrow morning and put some hardwire cloth on the bottom of the crate then lift it off the ground so she gets the air circulation under her as well!

 

[coach723]

Hard to find close ups of silkie earlobes, but here is one where you can see some darker pigment around the edges. And when you have mixes/crosses, all kinds of variations can happen.