Pipd's Peeps!

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Look at my poor boy Gus, he's gone into a rather hard molt. It's so difficult to be a big, tough guy with so many tender pins poking out of you!

Oh, and I forgot I was going to mention this--Choco 1 is back on his feet and starting to get around like normal again! I've been tube feeding him once a day instead of three times, just first thing in the morning, and he's eating well enough on his own the rest of the day to keep his spirits up! His one leg still causes him issues, but he's starting to put it underneath him again and trying to walk normally. I wonder if he got a leg injury from the other cockerels when he started feeling ill and that's what caused him so much trouble? Either way, he seems to be on the right track now and almost back to health!

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

AAAAH, I AM SO EXCITED!! I found a farm with silkied Chocolate Cochin bantams and I've just gotten on their wait list for hatching eggs next year!! That saves me a couple generations of breeding trying to introduce the gene from smooth feathered Cochins! I can't wait!!

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Choco 1 is using his leg really well today! Still hobbling a bit and not really putting full weight on it, but putting it down on the ground to stand normally! I am no longer tube feeding him as of a couple days ago, and am considering how I'm going to move him back outside with the other babies. I do have a dog crate to put him in, but it's a little bent up on the bottom and I don't want him re-injuring himself tripping on that... Gonna have to think about how to fix that up.

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Black 1 got stung by something on the face today. When I saw his face all swollen, I had a moment of dread thinking it was a respiratory disease, but after checking him over thoroughly, I found the little bump where he was stung above his eye. He looks awful right now, but is eating, drinking, breathing, and moving around normally, thankfully.

Poor little dum-dum must have tried to eat a wasp or something.

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Washburne says hellooo. Or, maybe she says, 'my, what a shiny camera lens you have!'

I took the calipers out and measured Pete and Jack's legs to get an idea what size leg band I would need for the silkied Cochins for identification in the future. I think I'm going to go for a two-color system where one color tells me which coop they originated from and the other color tells me what year they hatched. I feel like I'll probably remember this for the most part, or at least have this thread to look back on if I don't, but I'd like a system for easy reference in case I can't look it up at the time for whatever reason and to make sure I don't misremember or make a mistake. I am only human!

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Got a couple more names this morning! First is Black 3, who my friend has decided to name Hellebore! This is the same friend who named Rosey, so I reached out to ask if she'd like to name another chicken since Rosey can't stay, and she was happy to pick out a flower name for this little lady as a likely future flower girl in Gus's group. So, officially introducing Hellebore!

The other one is Blue 3! I was looking through a few names that might fit for Blue 1 yesterday, and none of them really clicked, but then this morning I thought, hmm, does Blue 3 look like a Wyatt instead? And, as it turns out, he does. So, also introducing Wyatt!

I've decided to let Black 2 go with the other boys, and am still on the fence about Black 1. Black 1's swelling is finally coming down from his sting, so I'll have to take a good look at him once it's gone and really think about it. Feed costs are weighing on my mind these days, and he'd only be one additional mouth to feed... but still a mouth to feed. So, I've got to think about whether it's really worthwhile to keep him on board or not.

Oh, and Choco 1 is back outside and doing marvelously!

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

The swelling is finally, finally almost gone from Black 1's face this morning. I was growing concerned that maybe something else was going on since it was taking so long for it to actually go away, so I'm quite relieved to see him looking almost back to normal this morning.

Can't imagine he'll mess with stinging insects anymore after all this!


I may or may not have settled on Athena for Blue 4's name, I don't know. It didn't necessarily 'click' like I look for, but it also didn't not click? We'll see, I guess. For now, I've been calling her Athena rather than baby girl or whatever else placeholder I come up with. That leaves Blue 2 as my only pullet without a name, and her plus Blues 1 and 5 are the last of the babies definitely still needing names now.

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Just a picture of the glorious Gwenyth this morning. That is all.

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Time for a check in with the babies! They are about 3 months old now!

Check out Black 1! That was the side of his face that was stung, and it looks a whole lot better today! Man, now that the swelling is down, I sure am torn about whether I want to keep him or not. He's a pretty good looking young man!

The lighting was all over the place for the Blues, so their color isn't quite accurate this time around, but close enough. These pictures made Wyatt and Blues 2 and 5 look lighter than they actually are, and Athena and maybe Ottilie a bit darker. Their previous pictures (all the way back on page 308) are a lot more accurate to color.

Nothing much else to add here. They're all doing good and growing up so fast!

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

My leg bands arrived today! I only got an assorted color pack of 50 to see if it would be the right size and it was perfect! Loose enough on the boys' thicker legs, but not so loose that they'll pop over the girls' feet! They even stayed on the 3-month-old girls' feet! Since it was a random assortment, it didn't come with enough of each color to band everyone, but I did what I could. Green for birds that start in or hatch out of Gus's group, red for Pete's group, and blue for the Blues. I also did orange for the 2020 birds, brown for the 2021 birds, and yellow for the 2022 birds. Year only on 'extras' like Jack, but both for birds hatched from shipped eggs who will be going into those pens. It covered everyone except Pete's girls since the assortment only had 3 reds in it, and some of the keeper boys from this year since it only came with 4 yellows. I'll have to figure out what I'll need for the rest of them and estimate for next year's hatchings, and then order several different colors next time so that I'm covered. I'm figuring on reusing colors every 5 years (so orange will be 2020 and 2025, brown will be 2021 and 2026, etc.) since there aren't enough different colors to do that many years and coops individually, so anything that's not used now will get used eventually.

Anyway, I got Trixie to model for me. You can see she was super pleased to cooperate with the idea after I roughed her up putting the bands on her to begin with.