Fluffy Butt Acres: Stories of our flock

[mapurcel]

My fluer likes to sun bathe next to me. Makes me feel special! Here she is next to my flower pants <3

 

[BY Bob]

Did you have the same heat wave last week? It's quite possible this is all stress from the heat. Hopefully if it is, Diana will be able to bounce back.

This could very likely be true if she got over heated.

 

[featherhead007]

Good ol reliable Jaffar (my rooster for you new peeps) he just herded all his ladies back into the barn/coop. What a sight to behold! I really love that rooster!
saves me a lot of time searching for stragglers!

 

[featherhead007]

Good ol reliable Jaffar (my rooster for you new peeps) he just herded all his ladies back into the barn/coop. What a sight to behold! I really love that rooster!
saves me a lot of time searching for stragglers!

Time for a Jacuzzi and some time for myself! Good night BYC

 

[ChicoryBlue]

How have you been giving all that calcium? Powdered in food? Or are you throwing pills down their throats (a new found skill of mine!)?

By crushing to powder in a mortar, then mixing with some Greek yogurt I make (have had to make it more often now that I'm not the only one eating it!) then mixing until thick with their old all-flock crumbles because pellets don't make a moldable mash. I let it sit a bit to thicken, then form little balls out of it. Small marble size. I had just let them peck at the little mash pile, but this tends to ensure they're eating it all, none is left behind and not much gets flung about. Today I made up all the balls before I served it to them, because sometimes they're like piranhas and gobble them up as fast as I can make them. I enjoy handing them out, watching how everyone has a different style, and the bowl is available so no one has to wait for me if they don't want to. For instance Butters likes to take a ball and put it down to see it or something, then pick it up and hitch it back into her beak. She will be the victim of a steal unless there are more for the others. Today Peanut grabbed each ball from me or the bowl and walked away to eat it in private before coming back for more. Sometimes she eats it in pieces and sometimes whole. Popcorn just stood right next to the dish and ate from my hand and from the bowl, hitching them back as fast as she could, until she had enough. Same with Hazel, who doesn't usually eat that much, but every few days she chows down.

 

[ChicoryBlue]

I have not. How does this work? I have one of seven having issues. Any recommendations how to get Naenae what she needs without over "medicating" (using this term very loosely) the rest?

Get her alone, or sneak her the calcium treat when no one's looking. That's what I did with Peanut sometimes, to make sure she got the lions share in the beginning when I knew Peanut laid a soft shell egg, shooting for 600mg for her at first. But I think there had been soft shells not necessarily only from her, so I let everyone have it, thinking like the oyster shell in time they would eat what they needed. I am backing off the crushed calcium now, going for just yogurt and making less.

 

[micstrachan]

Random chicken observation/thought

It boggles my mind to watch the girls movements. Particularly when they are excited to get to something and run toward it.


Kinda a blend of a bipedal and mack truck I find it so comical to watch them

Haha! Great analogy!

 

[micstrachan]

Great sadness
I don’t think Diana will last much longer. Maybe not even the night.
About a week ago I found an egg with no shell in the nest box.
Each day after there was evidence of a no shell egg - though it was always eaten (by Diana) by the time I found it.
It took me a while to be sure it was Diana’s rather than Elizabeth’s problem.
For sure Maggie was laying normally and so were the road runners.
While figuring it out I was dosing both Elizabeth and Diana with 400 mg of calcium citrate on top of layer feed and oyster shell available on demand.
I also scrambled eggs with calcium carbonate for anyone interested.
This morning I picked Diana up to give her the calcium pill and was immediately covered in egg yolk. She was fine running around and even caught a baby snake and played tug-o-war with Maggie for it.
I gave her a warm bath which she liked until she didn’t but that didn’t help and in the middle of the day i gave her more calcium and again I got covered in egg coming out of her vent. No shell.
I just lubed up and had a feel around but nothing to feel.
In the last couple of hours she has become clearly unwell. She is still drinking but has her tail down and is not chasing bugs let alone snakes.
I have put her in the brooder which is in the coop so she can be with her friends but the outlook doesn’t look good.
I don’t know how I feel. I don’t think I could have done anything else. I hate to see her so miserable, on the other hand she had a lovely chickeny day for most of the day.
I don’t know if I will be able to put her out of her misery if she is still alive but suffering in the morning. I don’t reallly know what to do.
Poor Diana.

Oh no. Poor Diana. I hope to read up and find she bounced back. If she were mine with eggs breaking inside and feeling lousy, I’d personally put her on a 10-14 day course of doxycycline or enrofloxacin.

 

[Aussie-Chookmum]

Happy Mugshot Monday from Deana looking a bit damp.

 

[Aussie-Chookmum]

She definitely had a good afternoon and tonight went to roost with everyone else.
Here she is drinking from the dripping gutter because the water in her hospital ward wasn’t mucky enough for her.

View attachment 2727379

Maybe mucky water has more flavour or trace elements. Mine have access to 6 different bowls of fresh water when free ranging and what does Edwina prefer to drink?
The "juice" dripping out of the worm farm.