Fluffy Butt Acres: Stories of our flock

[Ponypoor]

She’s the master of all she surveys, so she thinks!
It’s the flying CeeCee! She knows she’s a bird and her wings work quite well. View attachment 3966788

I see she’s taking notes from Little Grey!

 

[Ponypoor]

View attachment 3967061Thirsty Thursday
View attachment 3967060

He sure has fit in well hasn’t he

 

[Ponypoor]

They've been talking on BeakBook haven't they (Cee-Cee and @Ponypoor's AWOL lady)

What is it with the doors?!

Tippy and her band of merry chickies still try to get up on the doors in the Summer House if I am not careful!

And then it’s a quick hop into the space between those beams! I wonder how many eggs are up there I better check this weekend.

Tippy! Get down!

Butterscotch- get your butt down here!

 

[Ponypoor]

How will her joint, hip, or tendon heal if she's jumping/leaping about? Tylenol will only mask pain & make her keep bouncing around doing more injury she can't feel. Keep her in a crate for a while but then you know all that already. They're like toddlers to keep an eye on them all the time! Grey hair time

Yep it’s a fine line between keeping them quiet, and keeping them from getting depressed. Same with pain meds, they are more likely to continue to eat and drink if they are not in pain.

Tonight I will see if I can somehow wrap her pelvis to make it more stabilized.

I was able to get a better assessment of it this morning and I feel that it is either dislocated, or she has fractured the ball off her femur. I am going to see if I can get her to a Vet on Saturday for an X-ray, a fracture would not be a good thing.

But we shall see. She is eating drinking and pooping, so I will give her a chance to heal if possible.

 

[Ponypoor]

Yay! You had us worried.

I was just wondering how @Sylvester017 arm was doing!

 

[Ponypoor]

At long last princess and my doggo gets to see the garden without rain.
View attachment 3967012

Freedom!

 

[Ponypoor]

Coopers are originally forest birds, so they are actually very good at hunting in close quarters. They will typically hunt lizards, toads, snakes, mice, chipmunks, etc that are on the forest floor by sitting still on a branch 7-10 feet up and then jumping down on it. I think @BY Bob has video of one hopping down through his bush to get at a songbird inside the bush. They will also fly-chase small birds through the forest canopy.

But I’ve also (twice) seen them make an open-air high-speed attack on an exposed chickadee here, and having first lost the element of surprise, follow it, turn-for-turn, in very close pursuit (like a length away) as the chickadee flew in dodging moves through close tree branches. If the chickadee had made a mistake or tired, it would have been caught. Its only chance is to stay just enough ahead long enough to tire the hawk. It cannot really hide anywhere, or fly faster.

Coopers have a slim body and short broad wings relative to their body size that make them very agile flyers in close quarters. I agree with @bgmathteach that your theory that there is more abundant prey elsewhere is one reason your setup has succeeded. A park where people might be feeding birds, thus attracting mice too, sounds ideal, as long as it’s not too far from their preferred wooded nesting spots.

You seem to only mostly see juveniles, and in the Spring. They sound like they’ve been driven out of their home area, trying to survive elsewhere. So another reason you’ve been lucky may be that you’re not in a major migration flight path. If so, unlike some others on BYC (@BY Bob, me, @micstrachan, @bgmathteach) you are not exposed to many adult migrating hawks in the Spring and Fall. That alone greatly lowers the odds of your setup being challenged by an experienced hawk passing through. One that has survived its first year is probably going to know what it’s doing. A few years old and it’s an expert. You may just have a small local population that sticks to the better hunting grounds in the park, migrating to and from there.

Can you tell I’m jealous?

I have seen sharp shinned hawks show up out of nowhere and kill a dove, it seemed to defy the spruce tree branches, the dove was a sitting duck

 

[Sylvester017]

Yep it’s a fine line between keeping them quiet, and keeping them from getting depressed. Same with pain meds, they are more likely to continue to eat and drink if they are not in pain.

Tonight I will see if I can somehow wrap her pelvis to make it more stabilized.

I was able to get a better assessment of it this morning and I feel that it is either dislocated, or she has fractured the ball off her femur. I am going to see if I can get her to a Vet on Saturday for an X-ray, a fracture would not be a good thing.

But we shall see. She is eating drinking and pooping, so I will give her a chance to heal if possible.

Bless you for your care! For lonely confinement a mirror has worked wonders for our isolated hens. Tape, wire, string, hang, etc, a handheld mirror to the inside of the crate. Those vain ladies love to see their reflections. Somehow breaks the loneliness of seeing another chicken face. We also leave a radio on sometimes w/a talk station, sometimes soft music, or a TV for variety. Whatever seems the hen likes.

 

[Ponypoor]

A good reference for splinting and fracture examination.

https://theiwrc.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Duerr_Splinting_Manual_2010.pdf

 

[ChicoryBlue]

I have seen sharp shinned hawks show up out of nowhere and kill a dove, it seemed to defy the spruce tree branches, the dove was a sitting duck

Yup, same deal! Those hawks are the Coopers’ slightly bigger brothers (or sisters) of the forest!