Fluffy Butt Acres: Stories of our flock

[BY Bob]

They're all for a friend whose husband had a stroke and are having a hard time. They will eat 1 or 2 roosters and sell the remainder to make ends meet. It helps them and we get our chick fix without increasing our flock size.

What a marvelous gift for them. Well done!

 

[featherhead007]

My friend from church today, gave me a stack of egg cartons (new ones from Walmart) and three one pound packages of soldier fly larvae. Stuff is hard to get lately, but he found them again. I guess he heard me asking for empty cartons. Other people brought empty cartons as well.
(Not these cartons)

 

[BY Bob]

My eggs are halfway through incubation and last night I informed grandma I wanted to show her something. I inadvertently had her in tears when I showed her the little ones dancing in their shells. She really cannot wait until they begin hatching.

That made me tear up. I'm so happy you are doing this for her. So generous of you.

 

[BY Bob]

I will remember that for future.
I think I am researched out on this. I feel I have enough of a sense to make some feed decisions. So next I am going to look at the feed labels again armed with my new knowledge.

Let me know what you settle on for feed. I'll let you do the heavy lifting for me on this one.

 

[micstrachan]

I think the California thing is just that it was studied. Nobody has ever looked at the causes of death of backyard chickens in Michigan or Florida or France, but someone once did a study in California.

Ah. Understood.

 

[BY Bob]

Miserable day today started with snow, which melted around noon when the sun came out but the wind picked up and was fierce all day. It didn't get warmer then 4C (39F) so the sun was completely useless.

Add in a vicious migraine and it made for a grumpy day...

Around 3:30 I called it quits and called the horses in and managed to get this action shot. The highlight of the day....
View attachment 3057876

Can't wait for the sun to go down, and the wind settles down.

Great photo. Sorry you are unwell and the weather was so bad.

 

[micstrachan]

Specially for @micstrachan - I have done this as a reply to my original post so the sources and my summary stay together.
A few caveats:

• I am not a vet or a poultry nutritional scientist. I do have some experience in reading scientific papers but it is all a long time ago!
• I did not pay for access to full tex t if it was not available for free (I also didn't sign up for anything in order to get access to full text). This means that in some cases I could not judge the scientific methods because only the abstracts were shared. This is important because not all methods are robust and many studies are based on quite small numbers of observations
• In reading any scientific paper on chicken health you need to look carefully at the end point measurements in terms of what they consider a good outcome. Many articles are aimed at the commercial chicken industry and so measure outcomes related to that - such as carcas weight or increased laying. Obviously I was not interested in that so I rejected a load of articles (mainly not included here) whose measurements I could not connect to health in the way we mean it for our beloved chickens

With all that said, here is some reading for anyone who wants to go down the same rabbit-hole that I did!

https://www.merckvetmanual.com/poultry/fatty-liver-hemorrhagic-syndrome/fatty-liver-hemorrhagic-syndrome-in-poultry?query=fatty liver in chickens
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0032579119319856
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8378221/
https://www.dopharma.com/technical-support/fatty-liver-haemorrhagic-syndrome/ (this one is from a company selling choline supplements but it is a well written summary of FLHS and cites multiple academic sources)
http://www.poultrydvm.com/condition/choline-deficiency (not really an academic source)
https://cdnsciencepub.com/doi/pdf/10.4141/A06-043
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0300985813503569 (this is the California study - it is based on necropsies sent into the state system over a number of years)
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/03079457608418164?src=getftr (this is not a scientific paper but a published review - old but very helpful - it explains why higher fat and lower carbohydrate in the diet may be best for the chickens because the disease seems to be caused in part by pathology in the manufacture of lipids from carbohydrates in the liver - this is referrred to in the Merck Veterinary Manual and is what @bgmathteach spotted - higher dietary fat reduces the liver manufacturing fat)
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0032579119458914 (support for a diet with 4% fat)
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0032579119473720
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31565961/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12828209/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27143762/
https://poultry.extension.org/artic...ients-for-poultry/flax-seed-in-poultry-diets/ (this is the article that had me thinking long term use of flax seed increased FLHS - it does not cite any sources for the assertion and I have found no academic study to support it - most say flax is beneficial in reducing FLHS and some say it doesn't have any effect - shame on the USDA, university extension organization and the author!)

PHEW - that was a marathon.

And here is a small tax contribution for Bob as I may now have provided the longest post on this thread ever with no pictures!

View attachment 3057243

Thank you for these! You know I have a degree in Biology from the University of California at Berkeley and was a practicing Molecular biologist for over ten years, right?

I GREATLY appreciate the articles and fully understand your disclaimers. I miss having free access to scientific articles, too!

Just glancing at the references, I won’t be surprised if the majority of birds in the northern California study were sent into UC Davis, where I send mine.

Thank you so much for pulling this all together!

 

[BY Bob]

Was out checking on birds. Cheetah came into the coop with some of the girls: food, water, checking on broody Jess,View attachment 3057894 checking on Thing (laying an egg), View attachment 3057892checking on babies (he talked to them)View attachment 3057890

Took this as I came out of the coopView attachment 3057885Silver doing sentinel duty. Pear was resting behind her. Shortly after I took the pic, PITA came up and took over: same spot, Silver started foraging.

2 conclusions:

1. When too few roosters, top hens take up the job.
2. PITA is 3rd in command. (Suspected, now confirmed.

I love watching the sentinels at work. It is a favorite part of tribe observations.

 

[micstrachan]

No tax required on posts about chickens, I have the @BY Bob Tax Manual, and I'm pretty sure that is a main directive, although it's a late edition.

Excellent posts, thank you again @RoyalChick !

@MaryJanet I will try to search your posts/thread to find the amounts of each - volume or weight - that you supplemented Peggy with. Did or do you supplement your whole flock, or just Peggy? Did you tailor it to the feed you were using, to compensate for it's particulars? For instance the Nutrena Feather Fixer label does list "choline chloride" and "sodium selenite" (is that selenium?) and "biotin" but they don't list amounts - maybe on their web site they might have a better breakdown, then go from there?

So - if one were to give their chickens some cottage cheese (whole milk?), how much per bird, and would that be per day, or what? Is it considered a "treat" and does one follow the "no more than 10% of diet" rule? And how do you figure that anyway? By weight? Calories? I actually don't know if I've ever seen a calorie listing on a feed label.

Does anyone know how the feed contents / ingredients are figured? When something like fat is measured to be 4% of the feed, is that by weight, volume, or calories? By the way @bgmathteach 's quoted ratio, though I think I understand the concept, had me wondering - energy to protein, but how measured?

@micstrachan I think RC's posts might have answered your question - that it seems better for the chicken to be using dietary fat to make yolks with, rather than making the fat for the yolks from carbohydrates, yes?

OK sorry again for a long post. Looking to translate our learning to actionable information, but I am way over my head.

All great questions. I have to reread RC’s post re: dietary fat vs. carbs.
I always ASSumed % was by weight, but you know what happens when one ASSumes…

 

[Kris5902]

Ain't no corvette in my driveway! Just Ol Blue and my 2008 Ford fusion Ol Bessie

On the subject of hay tho..... If it's not moldy or dusty or full of foxtail I feed it!

Chickens are great at getting rid of foxtail! The only thing on the island that will eat it, and they love it. I’m pretty sure the seeds don’t survive the chicken processing either… I virtually eliminated all the foxtail near my trailer, without even really trying!