MJ's little flock

[Perris]

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.

 

[MaryJanet]

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 think it's because she gets chased away from food by the other hens and she's tetchy about it.

Edie used to get chased away but she just ignored them, kept eating, and now they accept her.

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.

I'm going to set up the big coop today, so she'll have her first special breakfast opportunity tomorrow. She should gain weight once she's used to it.

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.

I once had a yoga teacher who did a guided meditation at the end of class. She used the golden light visualisation and I found it particularly warm and safe. I still use it every now and then.

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.
View attachment 3868302

It must be a very strange thing to grow up in a place of so much unique natural beauty and to observe it undergo so much development and tourism. In many ways, it's a very sad thing.

 

[Shadrach]

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.

Take consolation in it was quick and there was nothing you could have done anyway.

 

[MaryJanet]

Installing (really hanging) this.
View attachment 3868626

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.

OH no! I'm so sorry RC. I can't believe it. She was thriving once her leggies were sorted out!

 

[MaryJanet]

Take consolation in it was quick and there was nothing you could have done anyway.

That's a good point. Clearly Babs suffered little if at all.

But what an awful shock for RC.

 

[RoyalChick]

OH no! I'm so sorry RC. I can't believe it. She was thriving once her leggies were sorted out!

No that is Bernie who is still going strong on her looong legs.
This was Bernie’s main squeeze Babs who was running around foraging one minute and then suddenly dead.

This was Babs. So pretty and such a happy busy little hen.

 

[RoyalChick]

Take consolation in it was quick and there was nothing you could have done anyway.

Yes. I do. I just wish it was five years from now.
She was only two. Not a production breed - barnyard mix - and got lots of exercise as she was a dedicated forager.

 

[MaryJanet]

No that is Bernie who is still going strong in her looong legs.
This was Bernie’s main squeeze Babs who was running around foraging one minute and then suddenly dead.

This was Babs. So pretty and such a happy busy little hen.
View attachment 3868838

So sorry for mixing them up.

 

[MaryJanet]

Yes. I do. I just wish it was five years from now.
She was only two. Not a production breed - barnyard mix - and got lots of exercise as she was a dedicated forager.

Do you have any thoughts on what it might have been? A snake bite maybe?

 

[RoyalChick]

Do you have any thoughts on what it might have been? A snake bite maybe?

We don’t really have those kinds of snakes.
It was so sudden she didn’t even have any end of life spasms or flapping. She was pretty much sitting in the exact same position I had seen her in a bit earlier when she told me to go away.
I thought she was maybe going broody and wanted to stay on the nest. I almost missed that she wasn’t just sitting really still when I went to lock up.
The flock and I will miss her. She was a stabilizing influence.