Fluffy Butt Acres: Stories of our flock

[featherhead007]

Still busy in hospital. More tests, drugs and oxygen treatments. Big test tomorrow. Great that you’re thinking of me

I’m not having much fun 🫩

 

[kattabelly]

I've been skimming through posts, just catching up. I hope you're doing better and out of hospital soon @featherhead007 and that the tests are useful and not bad news in the meantime. And hope all everyone's unwell chickens are feeling better soon too.

Your Shetlands sound nice. How is their temperament as adults? Calm? Independent? Flighty? Skittish? Etc? Any egg photos?

Mine aren't really adults yet, they're only 5½ months and likely won't start laying now until it gets a bit lighter - we're on less than 8 hours of daylight at the moment. Based on what I've seen of mine so far and what I know of other people's birds, I'd say they're fairly hardy and self-reliant. Generally calm and easygoing, and not prone to panicking. Confident enough to be fine with bigger, more dominant birds but not especially bossy or mean themselves. Two of mine are complete numpties but the others are more clever. Not super friendly pet chickens, although a couple of them will come over and stand for a wattle rub or a short bit of grooming and I could probably get them tamer if I wanted. The others are less keen on being touched or held, but not all that skittish - they're comfortable just out of reach, or closer if there's food involved. Most of mine don't really have enough of a flight zone to herd without some physical prodding.

I'm very sorry about Dana, by the way. I was going to ask about how Dominiques compare to Barred Rocks - we don't really get Doms over here, afaik - but only if it won't make you sad to talk about.

 

[RoyalChick]

I took a vacation day. I need to use them by end of year anyways…

The task itself is simple enough, just takes a bit of fortitude and belief in one’s self.

I wrapped her in my egg apron and tied the stings to keep her from flapping. Cutting the skin was easy but the crop itself is a bit thicker and needs belief in one’s self to do it. Small incision is best, you can always make it a bit bigger but not smaller!

Picking out the debris requires patience. I spent an hr doing that. Smelly dirty work - the material is sticky and smelly. I had to ditch my gloves they were too big and I couldn’t use my hands properly.

Once all the obvious stuff I’m could easily get to was removed I flushed with a bit of normal saline. Squished the crop a bit to loosen the debris then went fishing for more.

It was amazing how big the crop area was and glow far in I went to find all that long green grass, mixed with all the fibre material - hay shavings… chunks of grain….

Ok I better get to sleep every I hope your having a good sleep of a hood evening.

What did you use to flush? Did you have some kind of bottle with a nozzle, or maybe a big syringe?