MJ's little flock

[BY Bob]

Dr Louise called and tells me Katie's kidneys are much improved! Her reading was 522 and 480 is the upper normal value for chickens. So that's brilliant!

That suggests her kidney injury was acute (regardless of what caused it, zinc toxicity being the most likely candidate).

The vet then suggested giving Katie her own breakfasts to address the weight loss, which is what I was already thinking. So each night I'll take her from the roost and put her in the big coop, which I'll stock with a feeder full of seventeen, which is a crumble with corn for adult hens. And some water. She can come out and join her friends after breakfast.

In a fortnight, she has another kidney and weight check. Hopefully we'll discover her kidneys are within normal range and that she's gained a little weight.

That is great news!

 

[MaryJanet]

That is great news!
I thought of you yesterday because my buddy and I were doing some work on the Chicken Palace and a gutter screw went missing.
We saw it fall and where it landed but couldn’t find it.
There we are crawling around looking in the dirt. No luck.
The magnet found it in seconds!

It's so easy to do and they're so hard to find.

I'm looking forward to having the magnetic sweeper. I just hope it doesn't get bogged down in the soft sand. I assume it will be a heavy device.

 

[MaryJanet]

That is great news!

Yes! I was surprised because I was thinking her recovery had been rather staggered and that perhaps she was experiencing a reversal.

 

[MaryJanet]

That is great news!
I thought of you yesterday because my buddy and I were doing some work on the Chicken Palace

Were you making improvements or doing maintenance?

 

[MaryJanet]

I took a couple of photos in case anyone's interested in seeing what's on the walls in the vet's consulting rooms.

When Katie's better, I may take pairs of hens in for check ups. It'll be good to know they're tracking well (or to get timely support if anything's amiss) and to get them on the books.

 

[MaryJanet]

A very rushed photo of Katie going up to the roost, but you can clearly see the blue dressing over her wound from today's blood sample.

I'll ask the neighbours to help me remove it tomorrow evening.

 

[ManueB]

Yes! I was surprised because I was thinking her recovery had been rather staggered and that perhaps she was experiencing a reversal.

I'm also very glad for the good Katie news !
Maybe she hasn't been herself just because healing is taking her a lot of energy, and she needs more food and rest than she normally would ?
I'm sure you must be feeling relieved with those results. It sounds like she should be improving soon with your deluxe individual breakfast plan.

It feels like it's been a long time.

View attachment 3868102

Everything smells and sounds soothing.

I love the picture, it is very calming.
I don't miss living in Nice, but living by the sea is special.

There is a technique used in some behavioural therapies to find for yourself a safe anchor point you can visualise whenever you are in a rough spot. For many years for me this was the fourth buoy at the cap de Nice, where we used to turn back swimming toward the beach. I only have an old crappy picture of it and being in the water the view was completely different - it felt like being very far from the land.

 

[BY Bob]

It feels like it's been a long time.

View attachment 3868102

Everything smells and sounds soothing.

It's is soothing me just looking at it from afar. I can imagine how nice it was to be there.

 

[RoyalChick]

Were you making improvements or doing maintenance?

Installing (really hanging) this.

It is bamboo beads. They make a lovely sound in the breeze, create shade for me, and I hope create a little hawk deterrence too.
It took Bernie a while to accept that the beads were not going to swallow her whole, and nor were they delicious worms she could swallow whole, but now she barges confidently through the curtain like a pro. Everyone else is short enough to just walk under it.

Doing this was a nice distraction in a tough week. Several folk here already know, but I lost Babs unexpectedly earlier in the week. It was a complete shock because it is hard to imagine a chicken looking healthier and more full of beans than Babs even a couple of hours before I found her body.
I am feeling a bit better now, but was a bit of a mess earlier.

 

[BDutch]

Installing (really hanging) this.

Very nice.

Doing this was a nice distraction in a tough week. Several folk here already know, but I lost Babs unexpectedly earlier in the week. It was a complete shock because it is hard to imagine a chicken looking healthier and more full of beans than Babs even a couple of hours before I found her body.
I am feeling a bit better now, but was a bit of a mess earlier.

Sorry to hear you lost Babs. Very strange if a completely fine looking hen just stops living out of the blue.