Fluffy Butt Acres: Stories of our flock

[Ponypoor]

Mhm, it sucks sometimes but it is what it is.

If it is a pullet, I wanna breed her with my Polish’s. And if it’s a cockerel, I want to breed it with my Polish’s… I think that it would be stunning.

Yes it would be interesting for sure.

 

[featherhead007]

Wyandotte passed the drive to town test. I took him with me. He sat on my right shoulder the whole time. Was quiet when I left the car, and was happy to see me when I returned with my groceries. He’s gonna be a great roo.

 

[RebeccaBoyd]

Wyandotte passed the drive to town test. I took him with me. He sat on my right shoulder the whole time. Was quiet when I left the car, and was happy to see me when I returned with my groceries. He’s gonna be a great roo.

I am so happy you ended up with a roo in your chicks. I know he is useless right now in leading your flock, but he will get there. Remember in a few months when your girls are beating him up not to intervene. It will be for his own good. I can see him pulling a Drumstick move though. He was randy, picked on the wrong hen and she turned and went to clobber him. He flew to me to save him from the angry hen. Sigh, I did hold and coddle him for a minute instead of putting him down to take his beating.

 

[rural mouse]

Today's project

Used leftover dough to make this

Baked it....broke it for the chickens....

Not taken today

 

[featherhead007]

Wyandotte passed the drive to town test. I took him with me. He sat on my right shoulder the whole time. Was quiet when I left the car, and was happy to see me when I returned with my groceries. He’s gonna be a great roo.

It is what it is. Wyandotte is not Sir Jaffar, far from it. But I’m giving the little guy a chance, and I will show him the same love I gave to my rooster buddy.

 

[Ponypoor]

Awww snuggled up with their big sisters

wee chicken is getting wattles. I fear it’s a cockerel

 

[BeastBaby]

Good afternoon everyone.

My room feels so empty. My room is the last with carpet still and it is where Gracie spent most of her time the last few years. She had arthritis and she did not feel comfortable walking on the slick floors. She should be in her spot between my bedside and my computer chair refusing to move and making me walk overtop of her if I needed to walk around it for something. I'm still in disbelief that she is gone. Mom took the dogs on a walk down to the horse ring yesterday morning. It had rained all day and throughout the night so the creek was up. She sat on the bleachers for a hour and let them play in the creek since we were going to give them a bath yesterday. Gracie swam to her hearts content and got filthy without being scolded for it. On their way back home in front of my next door neighbors another neighbor was leaving. Mom said he was crawling and she had the dogs in my neighbors yard behind her. Gracie did something she had not done since she was a pup, came out of a sit and bolted in front of my neighbor's car. Mom could not stop her and my neighbor could not stop in time and he hit her. Mom is a wreck, my neighbor is a wreck and really, the rest of us are in the same shape. CeeCee is lost without Gracie. She is just laying in the living room, awake but whining. She refused to eat yesterday and her food bowl is still untouched. 22 years, for over 22 years I have had at least one Golden Retriever in my life and it feels so wrong now that I do not have one.

Just catching up and saw this- I’m sorry

 

[BeastBaby]

Furious, sad, upset

Whiskers has killed here two chicks I put under her. I was only up at the house an hr and ran back to the barn to check them. She had killed them. She has lost her chance to ever have chicks ever again and this weekend she will go to broody breaking jail.

I really thought she would take to them, she was at day 19.

Now I can only hope that Curly keeps her babies. She did the shimmy and tucked them up under her so I can hope she is a good mama.

I have only had good luck with my broodies so to have this happen is a total shock. I guess I won’t be fostering babies on hens anymore, too much risk of harm to the babies - and not hatching eggs either, too much risk of Roos.

Oh damn!

 

[TX Chick Noob]

Hi everyone. I know I rarely post any more, life has just gotten so incredibly busy. But I do try to read the weekly synopsis and check out some of the threads, and I miss you all.

This is going to be a long post.

I have some really sad news, I lost one of my girls today. Goldy, one of my two-year-old ISAs had been laying large eggs with weird wrinkles on one end for quite some time, and then started acting a little off several weeks ago. I tried to keep an eye on her, checked her crop, etc. She seemed to snap out of it, but came up and talked to me a few times when she had never been one of my friendly ones. A little over a week ago I picked her up and noticed her abdomen was a little swollen. Checked her several more times over the next few days and decided it definitely felt like what I have seen people describe when their chicken has Ascites. Unfortunately, right about that same time Sassy, another two-year-old ISA started acting like something was wrong. And then I noticed she wasn’t getting down off the roost at all. Her cropped seemed to have a small knot in it, but not anywhere near as bad as I have had them get before and been able to get them over it. I took her some water in a small bowl because to has started getting hotter and she sucked down the entire thing, plus most of another one. That gave her a very full squishy crop, that had not gone down all the way the next morning. Sassy really didn’t seem to fit the pattern of an impacted crop, it seemed more just slow, with small bits left in the morning. I got it in my mind that they both were probably having reproductive issues, especially being hatchery quality production birds who had rarely gone a day without laying up until the past month or so, and made the decision to just monitor them and give them supportive care, and let them go on their own terms. Especially since money is so tight after all my husband’s health issues last year and him still being on disability. I know Ascites can rarely if ever be treated successfully long term so didn’t have much hope for Goldy, and Sassy had gone downhill pretty quickly over a few days and I didn’t expect her to make it.

I decided to put Sassy in a crate in the coop since I didn’t want her to fall of the roost, and so I could give her soft food and water with nutridrench in it. Goldy was still getting around fine, eating and drinking so I left her alone. Sassy seemed to rally a little with the extra supportive care. So I decided to try to really flush her crop out well and try to give her a chance, in case it really was just a crop issue. After a few days of really working with it I was pretty sure I was feeling the same thing left in her crop each time, and on Wednesday decided to take her to the vet who did crop surgery on Crystal a little over a year ago. He did an exam and also a fecal test since she was nice enough to poop a little while we were there. Her heart rate was fast but not too weak, lungs seemed fine with no sign of respiratory issues, and no worms or coccidiosis. But she is down to 2.5 lbs, and he didn’t think she is strong enough for surgery. So he sent me home with an anti-inflammatory and antibiotic (to make sure there isn’t a secondary infection starting in her crop) and had me get some parrot hand feeding formula to try to get a lot of calories in her.

I have been treating her, and also keeping an eye on Goldy, watching for any sign she was starting to be in distress or have reduced quality of life. I also was feeding her any of Sassy’s food that was left over when so couldn’t get her to take any more. I was also talking to my husband today about how she seemed to be starting to struggle just a little, and when the vet’s office called to check on Sassy I told them about her symptoms and my suspicions, to see if they thought it was time to let her go, or if they thought I might be wrong and it was something else that was treatable. They said they couldn’t say for sure without seeing her, but that there was a chance it was just egg yolk peritonitis which they have sometimes managed to treat. We were out to eat at the time, and I had pretty much decided to take her in on Monday morning and see what they thought.

When we got home, I made Sassy’s food and went out to feed her and then put them all back in the coop for the night. When I walked in, I found Goldy lying right inside the door, muddy and with her head swollen and covered in blood. The other hens had pecked her almost to death, she was just barely alive. I was devastated. I put her out of her misery, I never wanted her to suffer like that.

I went back through the footage on my coop cam, and still can’t figure out what triggered the attack. I hadn’t really seen anyone picking on her the past week, no more than the usual pecks on occasion and no worse than anyone else. She had just been calmly standing by Sassy’s cage, like she had done many times, and one of them suddenly ran up and pecked her. She tried to run behind the cage, and they chased her down. Eight of them brutally attacked her for several minutes, until she just laid there when they stopped. Over the course of the next five hours one would occasionally go grab her head and if she tried to get away at all there were suddenly several attacking her again. Even when she stopped moving at all they would occasionally go peck at her again for several minutes.

I am so upset. I know chickens can get aggressive on occasion, but never expected such a brutal attack that was seemingly unprovoked. Not when I have had sick ones before that they never bothered.

My beautiful little golden chicken. My very first one to lay an egg. Rest in peace little one, I’m sorry your passing was anything but peaceful. Tomorrow we will find a good place to lay you to rest. (Although I am debating whether or not to use the opportunity to try a practice crop surgery on her, and to do a simple necropsy to determine what had caused her symptoms. In order to maybe be able to help another one in the future.)

Goldy as a chick, definitely the brightest yellow of my ISAs.

Her “ruffles”. She always had some curly frizzled feathers at the base of her tail.

Headed for a bite of pumpkin last October.

I wish I had a better recent photo of her. She was a little darker last year, but a definite light golden brown this year, almost dark yellow.

 

[rural mouse]

Hi everyone. I know I rarely post any more, life has just gotten so incredibly busy. But I do try to read the weekly synopsis and check out some of the threads, and I miss you all.

This is going to be a long post.

I have some really sad news, I lost one of my girls today. Goldy, one of my two-year-old ISAs had been laying large eggs with weird wrinkles on one end for quite some time, and then started acting a little off several weeks ago. I tried to keep an eye on her, checked her crop, etc. She seemed to snap out of it, but came up and talked to me a few times when she had never been one of my friendly ones. A little over a week ago I picked her up and noticed her abdomen was a little swollen. Checked her several more times over the next few days and decided it definitely felt like what I have seen people describe when their chicken has Ascites. Unfortunately, right about that same time Sassy, another two-year-old ISA started acting like something was wrong. And then I noticed she wasn’t getting down off the roost at all. Her cropped seemed to have a small knot in it, but not anywhere near as bad as I have had them get before and been able to get them over it. I took her some water in a small bowl because to has started getting hotter and she sucked down the entire thing, plus most of another one. That gave her a very full squishy crop, that had not gone down all the way the next morning. Sassy really didn’t seem to fit the pattern of an impacted crop, it seemed more just slow, with small bits left in the morning. I got it in my mind that they both were probably having reproductive issues, especially being hatchery quality production birds who had rarely gone a day without laying up until the past month or so, and made the decision to just monitor them and give them supportive care, and let them go on their own terms. Especially since money is so tight after all my husband’s health issues last year and him still being on disability. I know Ascites can rarely if ever be treated successfully long term so didn’t have much hope for Goldy, and Sassy had gone downhill pretty quickly over a few days and I didn’t expect her to make it.

I decided to put Sassy in a crate in the coop since I didn’t want her to fall of the roost, and so I could give her soft food and water with nutridrench in it. Goldy was still getting around fine, eating and drinking so I left her alone. Sassy seemed to rally a little with the extra supportive care. So I decided to try to really flush her crop out well and try to give her a chance, in case it really was just a crop issue. After a few days of really working with it I was pretty sure I was feeling the same thing left in her crop each time, and on Wednesday decided to take her to the vet who did crop surgery on Crystal a little over a year ago. He did an exam and also a fecal test since she was nice enough to poop a little while we were there. Her heart rate was fast but not too weak, lungs seemed fine with no sign of respiratory issues, and no worms or coccidiosis. But she is down to 2.5 lbs, and he didn’t think she is strong enough for surgery. So he sent me home with an anti-inflammatory and antibiotic (to make sure there isn’t a secondary infection starting in her crop) and had me get some parrot hand feeding formula to try to get a lot of calories in her.

I have been treating her, and also keeping an eye on Goldy, watching for any sign she was starting to be in distress or have reduced quality of life. I also was feeding her any of Sassy’s food that was left over when so couldn’t get her to take any more. I was also talking to my husband today about how she seemed to be starting to struggle just a little, and when the vet’s office called to check on Sassy I told them about her symptoms and my suspicions, to see if they thought it was time to let her go, or if they thought I might be wrong and it was something else that was treatable. They said they couldn’t say for sure without seeing her, but that there was a chance it was just egg yolk peritonitis which they have sometimes managed to treat. We were out to eat at the time, and I had pretty much decided to take her in on Monday morning and see what they thought.

When we got home, I made Sassy’s food and went out to feed her and then put them all back in the coop for the night. When I walked in, I found Goldy lying right inside the door, muddy and with her head swollen and covered in blood. The other hens had pecked her almost to death, she was just barely alive. I was devastated. I put her out of her misery, I never wanted her to suffer like that.

I went back through the footage on my coop cam, and still can’t figure out what triggered the attack. I hadn’t really seen anyone picking on her the past week, no more than the usual pecks on occasion and no worse than anyone else. She had just been calmly standing by Sassy’s cage, like she had done many times, and one of them suddenly ran up and pecked her. She tried to run behind the cage, and they chased her down. Eight of them brutally attacked her for several minutes, until she just laid there when they stopped. Over the course of the next five hours one would occasionally go grab her head and if she tried to get away at all there were suddenly several attacking her again. Even when she stopped moving at all they would occasionally go peck at her again for several minutes.

I am so upset. I know chickens can get aggressive on occasion, but never expected such a brutal attack that was seemingly unprovoked. Not when I have had sick ones before that they never bothered.

My beautiful little golden chicken. My very first one to lay an egg. Rest in peace little one, I’m sorry your passing was anything but peaceful. Tomorrow we will find a good place to lay you to rest. (Although I am debating whether or not to use the opportunity to try a practice crop surgery on her, and to do a simple necropsy to determine what had caused her symptoms. In order to maybe be able to help another one in the future.)

Goldy as a chick, definitely the brightest yellow of my ISAs.
View attachment 3850076

View attachment 3850077

Her “ruffles”. She always had some curly frizzled feathers at the base of her tail.
View attachment 3850078

Headed for a bite of pumpkin last October.
View attachment 3850079

I wish I had a better recent photo of her. She was a little darker last year, but a definite light golden brown this year, almost dark yellow.