***OKIES in the BYC III ***

[jcatblum]

Kass I will trade you. Been up all day. Feel like I never got a chance to catch my breathe, but I am wide awake! So frustrating. Got new pain meds today, not suppose to drive within 6 hours of taking them-- thought for sure they would aid in my good night sleep. Nope-- took meds @8 & still awake!

 

[Kassaundra]

Oh wow, meds knock me smooth out. I can take one benedryl and sleep for days. Well just heard they finally made it.

 

[Ksane]

Christina, I'd be very much interested in some of those Leghorn girls-very much. Does it sound like a rumor that might really come true? Because if so I can get started on building them a coop. We got busy and fenced several 50x50 chicken yards and then I lost my 2 oldest Cochin boys so there's no chickens in those yards. Rescue is SO up my alley-how can I find out more? My husband would be psyched to get a dozen or so of them. How many did you get?
Is there any coughing or contagious diseases they could have? Usually chickens like that have been kept so isolated they werent exposed to anything.
I've just GOT to get me some of those flop combs.
Kass, I'm glad your relatives made it ok. Will be thinking about you today. Burying a parent is a sad and difficult thng to go through.
I'm with you on the meds. When I can't sleep I take 1/2 a benedryl and I'm knocked out for 12 hours haha! 1/2 ounce of Nyquil and I'm out the rest of the week.

 

[Buster52]

Christina, I'd be very much interested in some of those Leghorn girls-very much. Does it sound like a rumor that might really come true? Because if so I can get started on building them a coop. We got busy and fenced several 50x50 chicken yards and then I lost my 2 oldest Cochin boys so there's no chickens in those yards. Rescue is SO up my alley-how can I find out more? My husband would be psyched to get a dozen or so of them. How many did you get?
Is there any coughing or contagious diseases they could have? Usually chickens like that have been kept so isolated they werent exposed to anything.
I've just GOT to get me some of those flop combs.
Kass, I'm glad your relatives made it ok. Will be thinking about you today. Burying a parent is a sad and difficult thng to go through.
I'm with you on the meds. When I can't sleep I take 1/2 a benedryl and I'm knocked out for 12 hours haha! 1/2 ounce of Nyquil and I'm out the rest of the week.

When I picked up my second 200 or so, I spoke to one of the owners at Fishers. He told me they would be selling several thousand out of their cage free barn in a couple of months and that they would call me when they do. I will let you know when I hear from them.

 

[jcatblum]

Was after 2 before I went to sleep & already up & had coffee! I am not a big coffee drinker, i drink it usually when my throwt is scratchy & i am too lazy to make tea. Wish sleep came easy, DH can sleep through anything-- sometimes I just think it isn't fair!

Mitzi - Buster is suppose to get a call when they have their next liquidation, they reduce their layers when they add new pullets to their flock. We got 2 dz of them. Think this our suppose to be the last of the caged ones, but I don't expect the others to be much different, except maybe they will get sunlight?? Or maybe that will be their new batches of birds. If I remember correctly a new law was passed about the space chickens get & they were suppose to get roost?? I am sure someone has some more info on it. When Buster gets to feeling better I am sure he will jump in & share more that he knows about them. --- Buster I do hope you have a speedy recovery from that nasty bite!!!

Kass we are thinking of you-- I know there isn't alot we can do from here. Hope the day allows you to celebrate your mom with your family in a good way!

ETA-- buster was faster than me!!! I knew he had more info than my foggy brain remembered!
It is raining here! Hopefully we get another inch this weekend. My garden will love it! Bad side is might have to mow next wk. oh well take the good with the bad...

 

[NanaKat]

Must be the year for spider bites. Buster's brown recluse and a friend got bit by a black widow on his stomach while bundling empty feed sacks in the barn....neurologic damage for two weeks...spasms in his muscle in his arms...can't work...he is a police officer.

Kass, thoughts and prayers for you and your family today.

Third day for the dozer man..he brought one of those big earth movers yesterday like you see along the highway. Wow! watching the process has been interesting. Should be the last day today. He wants to get it finished before the rains come this weekend.

Have been losing a few birds over the past week. Lost some OEGB and two LF pullets in the growout pen. Have 4 in quarantine with Tylan 50 shots and vitamins in a protein diet with Brewer's yeast and Selenium.

Going to try to work some in the garden today.

Hope every one has a good day.

 

[Ksane]

Buster and Christina-thank you for the Leghorn info. Build coop and they will come, I say. It'll give me something to baby and take care of without having to deal with brooders and heat lamps and grow-out pens. And I do love those combs, from what I understand they're supposed to be that way? I think Mike D said they were, someone did. Please do keep us updated and get ahold of me. I'll get a dozen of them and see how it goes. Buster, you got 200?? You're going to have more eggs than you know what to do with. I'm really excited! That gives me time to get their coop built and have things ready.
Buster, I didn't realize you were still having problems with the fiddleback bite. Those things scare the bejesus out of me.

 

[Ksane]

Ok. I've recommended Frontline for lice and mites for a long time now but this post on the Dorking thread at
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/118388/b-y-c-dorking-club/2290
has changed my mind. I Frontlined my Cochins and lost 2 of them the 2 wks following. My husband kept saying it could've been the Frontline and I brushed him off. Now I'm feeling a bit sick, these 2 (and the one I lost last spring) were my top favorite birds of all time. I wouldn't put so much stock into what this person says except she's a veterinarian and what she says makes sense.
Just in case I won't be using Frontline. I was only doing it as a preventative, that's what makes me feel even worse. There's no way of knowing if that's what killed my Cochins....but it's awful suspicious.
Here's her post:
(And for the record I've been looking for Dorking eggs for quite some time now if anyone knows of someone with them).





Hi Everyone,

I agree that Frontline Spray is very effective against mites, HOWEVER, I would not recommend using it in chickens. I am a veterinarian. Years ago I had a client who was also a personal friend. She brought her flock in to see me at the clinic, and the mites were so bad that the birds were pale from anemia. I initially told her how happy I'd been with the effect of Frontline Spray on mites when I worked at a wildlife rescue clinic. Every pigeon/dove had mites, and one spray took care of them almost immediately. She asked me if there was any risk, since these birds were her daughter's lifeline right then -- he had set up the coop and bought her the chickens 2 years ago, and he had recently died in a car accident. This was a situation where NO risk was acceptable. Not knowing the sensitivity of chickens specifically, as opposed to thousands of problem-free doses on wild pigeons and other species, I called Merial, the manufacturer of Frontline Spray. When a member of the public calls and asks these questions, they just tell you not to use it if it's not been cleared for that species. They can't afford the liability if the untested recommendation doesn't work out. But when another veterinarian calls, they put their veterinarian on the phone and there's often a long conversation about old research and common usage. Well, the bottom line was that there's a lot of non-published research on Frontline Spray on a large number of different bird species. Most birds it's quite safe on, even at high doses. And there are some that it's quite poisonous on. But chickens are in the middle ground. The therapeutic range is quite narrow in many chickens (which means that the dose it takes to kill or harm the bird is only slightly higher than the dose it takes to kill the mites). The veterinarian from Merial said that many people use Frontline Spray on chickens with no obvious problems, but that many others end up with dead birds. He STRONGLY recommended not using it on birds that you care about, just in case your birds are more sensitive than others.

I use the injectable ivermectin (made for cattle) in my birds, but I give it orally. (Please note: I am not making a medication recommendation. Since none of you are my clients, I cannot legally prescribe to your birds without a doctor/patient/client relationship. I am only sharing with you what I give my own birds. What I do is off label (non-FDA approved) usage. There is no established withdrawal time on meat or eggs for ivermectin in chickens. I hate all this legal stuff, but it's the world we live in.) The dose range is huge, with most references citing 0.2 - 0.4 mg/kg, but Gail Damerow (The Chicken Health Handbook) recommends giving 0.25 ml (2.5 mg) to large birds, which is a much higher (and I assume safe, unless there's a typo) dose. But I've always wanted to use the pour-on solution instead. Ki4got, does it ever cause any irritation to the skin?? If you've checked the area for irritation once daily for at least a week after application on a large number of birds, I'd love to know about it so I can switch on my own birds. If there's a risk of skin irritation, then I'll stick with the oral route, which is easy.

--April

 

[Buster52]

Was after 2 before I went to sleep & already up & had coffee! I am not a big coffee drinker, i drink it usually when my throwt is scratchy & i am too lazy to make tea. Wish sleep came easy, DH can sleep through anything-- sometimes I just think it isn't fair!
Mitzi - Buster is suppose to get a call when they have their next liquidation, they reduce their layers when they add new pullets to their flock. We got 2 dz of them. Think this our suppose to be the last of the caged ones, but I don't expect the others to be much different, except maybe they will get sunlight?? Or maybe that will be their new batches of birds. If I remember correctly a new law was passed about the space chickens get & they were suppose to get roost?? I am sure someone has some more info on it. When Buster gets to feeling better I am sure he will jump in & share more that he knows about them. --- Buster I do hope you have a speedy recovery from that nasty bite!!!
Kass we are thinking of you-- I know there isn't alot we can do from here. Hope the day allows you to celebrate your mom with your family in a good way!
ETA-- buster was faster than me!!! I knew he had more info than my foggy brain remembered!
It is raining here! Hopefully we get another inch this weekend. My garden will love it! Bad side is might have to mow next wk. oh well take the good with the bad...

Thanks, Christina. I was getting better pain wise until the doc dug a hole 2 1/2 inches long and an inch deep in my leg taking out dead tissue. He stuffed it full of medicated string so I wouldn't have a gaping hole in my leg. Now it seems to have gone back to that burning sensation. Sure hope this guy knows what he is doing.

The main difference between these cage free birds and ours is they haven't been crammed into tiny cages their whole lives, so they know how to peck around in the dirt and scratch, and shouldn't bunch up like these do. The losses I have had so far have been from piling up on the cooler nights. But the cage free birds still have no access to outdoors and are still in very crowded conditions, so this will still be a rescue operation.

 

[erinszoo]

Our best cucmbers this yr were armanian. They are still producing. We only planted 1/2 a pack of ferry Morris brand seed & Taron has sold at least $50 worth @ market. We took this wk off market & she was made because she has cucumbers to sell & it isn't fair that I don't take her to sell them!
Even at 9lbs the armanians were still tender. Skin & all. We will grow them every yr now!!!!

I haven't tried Armenians. We'll have to do a run of those next year.
Missed yesterday but I'm only 4 pages behind. Hehehe. Woke up this morning to a new noise and discovered my silkie boy has started to crow.

There wasn't any doubt he was a boy but my other bantams have been crowing for two months now so I was beginning to wonder if he would ever crow. Of course he bit me yesterday and sliced open the side of my thumb. He was attacked by the other chickens when he was younger so any time we try to corner him to pick him up and put him back in his pen after free ranging, he freaks out and bites whoever ends up in front of him. At least all of his feathers are coming back in. The fair is in 17 days and I hope all his feathers are grown back out enough to show him. I just love this little bird.

Hope to get our garden bed rebuilt and planted between the rain events today. We've gotten .05 inches of rain this morning but it's supposed to clear off and reform this evening. The chickens sure were happy to help us dig out all the dirt yesterday and eat the grubs and worms they found. It didn't take them long to figure out we had worms on offer and then they hung around and helped scratch.