Michigan Thread - all are welcome!

Bwahahahah. My muscovy laid through the cold spell. I've been so spoiled. Four normal sized ones and one slightly undersized one equals a pound apparently. For some reason all these round, smooth eggs makes me way too happy, especially since I only really use these for custard, baking, or for making more huffing/honking steak goose-ducks.
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I have a hen who’s feathers are looking pretty rough. I’m not sure if she’s molting, getting picked on or what. She’s not quite a year old and has never been the most friendly one. But she will it let me get close to her at all to catch her. I’ll have to maybe pull her from the roost at night. Could it be mites or lice? I’ve never had to deal with any of that before.
 
I had to bring a hen in the garage 2 nights ago. She molted very late, and her back is covered with pin feathers. When I found her she weak, exhausted and icy to the touch in a nest box. She has spent the last 2 days in a dog crate with food and water in front of her (temp more around 35, around 40 degrees warmer than out in the coop). She is feeling much better, although not grateful at all for having been saved. If it warms up tomorrow she will go back out, although with close monitoring.

In this kind of bitter cold anything that makes a bird less than fully healthy can contribute to cold deaths. Recent brooding, birds that are debilitated due to hard molting, poorly feathered birds, external or internal parasites, or anything else that affects their ability to eat normally or retain enough heat can push them over the edge.
 
The best time to dust or spray is at night when they are roosting! Take a flashlight, your face mask, and hopefully another person, and for dusting, take each bird off the roost, dust, and put her back on the roost. In dim light, it's not such a rodeo.
Mary
 
Haha! Just finished cleaning out 2 coops,runs and treating my chickens! Only took 3 hrs not sure if I could have done it any faster. What a challenge catching the remaining bantams. Thank goodness most of my big birds are fairly docile and it was close to roosting time. Will give a better inspection tomorrow night when they'e roosting my safety glasses kept fogging up.

BTW my little rooster didn't make it. He was dead when I got home this afternoon. This has definitely been a huge learning experience for me. I thought I was doing good by sprinkling their coops w DE when I cleaned them once a month and the occasional wood ash and DE in their runs.
 

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