This morning, I found the RIR lying dead in the garden. No signs of predation (nothing has ever gotten into the run with them except wild birds). We saw nothing unusual about her yesterday. She was lying as though sunning herself, so at first that's what I thought. Her eyes were closed, no distention of the neck or throat, her crop felt empty, her beak was closed. There was no sign of nasal drainage or vent distention. I'm no ornithologist, I just looked for clues.
Our flock of five (now four) have run of our vegetable garden space this summer. We let it lie fallow this year, and it's pretty much weed-grown, although the girls have kept it fairly controlled.
I've noticed that they do not eat such plants as onions and marigolds... I rather gathered that they don't eat things poisonous to them. They haven't even eaten the single sunflower that sprouted out of the weeds last week.
I use no pesticides or fertilizers. They eat chicken feed, scratch, and scraps like corn-cobs, vegetable pairings, melon rinds.
She was never a good layer, and her eggs had very soft or brittle shells, often no shells at all. I keep them supplied with calcium at all times, so I wasn't sure if she just didn't eat it, or if she had some other issue.
She was 1-1/2 years old, and a strange bird... I never really liked her, to be honest. She was "not right" a lot... very flighty and panicky and just acted odd. She was the bottom of the pecking order, but always got enough to eat, and was allowed in the flock proper. When we tried to integrate some younger americaunas into the flock, she became almost psychotic about them. She tried to dig under the crate they were in to get at them, chased them back and forth along the crate obsessively (still separated from them), and finally, they were killed when they got out of the crate, and she was found hovering over the bodies, still pecking at them. The other birds didn't act that way at all.
Any thoughts? Genetic issue, plant poisoning, finger of God? I won't be calling in CSI to investigate this, so I'm just looking for brain-storming.
Thanks!
Our flock of five (now four) have run of our vegetable garden space this summer. We let it lie fallow this year, and it's pretty much weed-grown, although the girls have kept it fairly controlled.
I've noticed that they do not eat such plants as onions and marigolds... I rather gathered that they don't eat things poisonous to them. They haven't even eaten the single sunflower that sprouted out of the weeds last week.
I use no pesticides or fertilizers. They eat chicken feed, scratch, and scraps like corn-cobs, vegetable pairings, melon rinds.
She was never a good layer, and her eggs had very soft or brittle shells, often no shells at all. I keep them supplied with calcium at all times, so I wasn't sure if she just didn't eat it, or if she had some other issue.
She was 1-1/2 years old, and a strange bird... I never really liked her, to be honest. She was "not right" a lot... very flighty and panicky and just acted odd. She was the bottom of the pecking order, but always got enough to eat, and was allowed in the flock proper. When we tried to integrate some younger americaunas into the flock, she became almost psychotic about them. She tried to dig under the crate they were in to get at them, chased them back and forth along the crate obsessively (still separated from them), and finally, they were killed when they got out of the crate, and she was found hovering over the bodies, still pecking at them. The other birds didn't act that way at all.
Any thoughts? Genetic issue, plant poisoning, finger of God? I won't be calling in CSI to investigate this, so I'm just looking for brain-storming.
Thanks!
