Raising Baby Chick-Along

[WVduckchick]

@orrpeople congrats on your shiny new Friend badge. Much deserved, my friend!!

 

[orrpeople]

@orrpeople congrats on your shiny new Friend badge. Much deserved, my friend!!

Aww, thank you! I tell ya, after the last few days, if I didn't have my compassionate chicken peeps, I might have wanted to just quit the whole business. So although I still think catching a chicken who doesn't want to be caught is my least favorite part of chicken ownership, trying to figure out why they're not acting normal is the hardest part. Come on chicken, just tell me what's wrong and I can stop treating the whole flock for "what if?"

 

[WVduckchick]

Aww, thank you! I tell ya, after the last few days, if I didn't have my compassionate chicken peeps, I might have wanted to just quit the whole business. So although I still think catching a chicken who doesn't want to be caught is my least favorite part of chicken ownership, trying to figure out why they're not acting normal is the hardest part. Come on chicken, just tell me what's wrong and I can stop treating the whole flock for "what if?"

I soooo much agree with you. I feel bad for chasing them, but those are the ones that need to get used to it. Catch 22.
And i have a hen isolated right now, about to do a major coop cleanout. I'm about ready to throw in the towel.

 

[NorthTexasWink]

@WVduckchick Im sorry you're feeling overwhelmed and down. When I feel like that, I find it helpful to look not at the whole job ahead, but at just the smaller steps. Really, you can do anything for an hour, right? Or you can just do this little bit, easy! Then rest and recoup and go on to the next bit. You got this! The bad part will pass, as it always does. It's just temporary. It'll be back to happy soon, you just have to get through this little rough patch. You can't control every situation, but you CAN control your reaction to it. You are THAT strong. You wouldn't have gotten this far if you weren't.

 

[orrpeople]

I soooo much agree with you. I feel bad for chasing them, but those are the ones that need to get used to it. Catch 22.
And i have a hen isolated right now, about to do a major coop cleanout. I'm about ready to throw in the towel.

I'm with you, sister. My coops are pretty clean - although 1 clean coop + 1 chicken for 1 day =3,000,000 new poops. Okay, I exaggerated a little... but crumb, those birds do poo. I had been doing a bit of deep litter in a couple coops because my dirt is so rock hard that I wanted to build up the soil a bit. I don't think that's necessarily the cause of my issues, but it's definitely making me doubt myself and my choice in that. I also know that birds catch things. And there's a million factors out there that I can't control, even if I scraped every ounce of poo, every minute of every day (which might take some of the joy out of chicken ownership!! ) I cannot physically protect them from things I can't see. I also think the change of seasons this year has been hard on my flock in general. Darn it, yet another thing over which I have no control!! So I am learning the hard way to try and let go. I take so much pride in my happy birds, that when things don't go well, I get really depressed. And then I look objectively at my depressed self and think - silly girl, you've got to stop this and just get up and do the next thing - let go of that obsession with the rear-view mirror, and start looking out the windshield before you hit something!
We can do this. We can do this. We can do this!

 

[NorthTexasWink]

@orrpeople You go! What's behind you is there to teach you, not to stop you. If you are going forward as a wiser person, it's all good.

 

[WVduckchick]

@WVduckchick Im sorry you're feeling overwhelmed and down. When I feel like that, I find it helpful to look not at the whole job ahead, but at just the smaller steps. Really, you can do anything for an hour, right? Or you can just do this little bit, easy! Then rest and recoup and go on to the next bit. You got this! The bad part will pass, as it always does. It's just temporary. It'll be back to happy soon, you just have to get through this little rough patch. You can't control every situation, but you CAN control your reaction to it. You are THAT strong. You wouldn't have gotten this far if you weren't.

I'm with you, sister. My coops are pretty clean - although 1 clean coop + 1 chicken for 1 day =3,000,000 new poops. Okay, I exaggerated a little... but crumb, those birds do poo. I had been doing a bit of deep litter in a couple coops because my dirt is so rock hard that I wanted to build up the soil a bit. I don't think that's necessarily the cause of my issues, but it's definitely making me doubt myself and my choice in that. I also know that birds catch things. And there's a million factors out there that I can't control, even if I scraped every ounce of poo, every minute of every day (which might take some of the joy out of chicken ownership!! ) I cannot physically protect them from things I can't see. I also think the change of seasons this year has been hard on my flock in general. Darn it, yet another thing over which I have no control!! So I am learning the hard way to try and let go. I take so much pride in my happy birds, that when things don't go well, I get really depressed. And then I look objectively at my depressed self and think - silly girl, you've got to stop this and just get up and do the next thing - let go of that obsession with the rear-view mirror, and start looking out the windshield before you hit something!
We can do this. We can do this. We can do this!

Yep so right about all of that. Both of you! Thank you. Awesome BYC peeps are so good at keeping each other going.

My little Cleo got her spa treatment, so she and Dudley my pug decided to sit for a cup of coffee and enjoy the morning breeze.

 

[orrpeople]

Yep so right about all of that. Both of you! Thank you. Awesome BYC peeps are so good at keeping each other going.

My little Cleo got her spa treatment, so she and Dudley my pug decided to sit for a cup of coffee and enjoy the morning breeze.
View attachment 1064367

I'm pretty sure my indoor hen is not going to want to go back to "normal life" once her wound heals up. I worked so hard to get her to eat something (offering yogurt, scrambled eggs, bananas, watermelon, cantaloupe, meal worms, etc) that her little taste buds are not thrilled with chicken feed any more.
Good news, the little one I suspected of maybe having cocci was behaving normally all last night and this morning, so I sent her back out. But, I still did the preventative treatment and thoroughly cleaned the litter out of the coop she hangs out in most of the day (most of my birds free range, but the littles often just stay in coops until they get bigger and braver). While I was working (and sweating...a lot) I also got some ideas about transitioning the chicks from the tractor to a coop in the next week or so. It's a bit like a strategy game - "If I move the cockerels out to the bachelor pad, that will leave x number of pullets - If I move the pullets who recently started laying into the barn...." and on and on until somehow the numbers work out and I feel much better about my population out back!! And by the way, Happy July 4!!

 

[WVduckchick]

A story, I'll try to keep brief, but have to share.

So after Cleo got her spa treatment today, I needed to spray down the whole coop with permethrin, so i let the rest of the flock out into the yard. Closed their pen off, till the stuff could dry. So after it was all dry, and i added new bedding, i left the gate open so they could to back in. had lots of chores to do today, then I needed to go out for a while so I herded them all back into the pen. Oops, one is missing. 2-month old juvie. Dangit (more choice words). Looked all over for her, no luck. Several passes everywhere possible. Knew it would be close to dark before i got home, but had to go anyway.
Came home and no sign of her. More choice words. I have 3 other pens with chicks still learning how to use their ladders to get inside, so i rounded up all the stragglers. Could still hear a crying peep! Peep! Shined my light outside the fence and there was the little missing girl!! Yeah!!
i suppose she drifted into the woods a little too far, and had a girls night out, but she's back safe and sound.

 

[orrpeople]

A story, I'll try to keep brief, but have to share.

So after Cleo got her spa treatment today, I needed to spray down the whole coop with permethrin, so i let the rest of the flock out into the yard. Closed their pen off, till the stuff could dry. So after it was all dry, and i added new bedding, i left the gate open so they could to back in. had lots of chores to do today, then I needed to go out for a while so I herded them all back into the pen. Oops, one is missing. 2-month old juvie. Dangit (more choice words). Looked all over for her, no luck. Several passes everywhere possible. Knew it would be close to dark before i got home, but had to go anyway.
Came home and no sign of her. More choice words. I have 3 other pens with chicks still learning how to use their ladders to get inside, so i rounded up all the stragglers. Could still hear a crying peep! Peep! Shined my light outside the fence and there was the little missing girl!! Yeah!!
i suppose she drifted into the woods a little too far, and had a girls night out, but she's back safe and sound.

Ah! And after theses few days, definitely nice to have a happy ending story!! So glad you found your little girl!
Thanks for the inspiration to get a bunch of cleaning done today. Knowing someone else was working somehow made my work easier!