Shadrach's Ex Battery and Rescued chickens thread.

[Shadrach]

Two and a half hours yesterday. Grey and damp at 20C.
Had a thunderstorm midday and that made the soil just the right dampness for Henry to have a bath. He was in that hole he dug for over half an hour. None of the hens joined him.

No live mites at the mite check points but they are still some around because they've laid new eggs. Burnt the eggs.

The plot is a bit of a mess. I'm on minimum maintainance mode at the moment. Still got potatoes, courgettes, tomatoes and chard growing. growing

 

[Ladies-Eight]

Ex Batts good afternoon one and all!

Tea is ready.

Temperature is in the 80s hazy feels like 102 with expected rain.

Have a wonderful Labor Day and lots of fun!

 

[LaFleche]

Thank you for your kind words, much appreciated!

@Perris
@MaryJanet
@fluffycrow
@L-plate chicken mum
@BDutch
@Ladies-Eight
@Sequel

 

[LaFleche]

How long did the shingles last?

The blisters about 10-14 days, the crusts took longer to fall off.

 

[Shadrach]

My commiserations @LaFleche and @Ladies-Eight.
Two and a half rather damp hours today. The weather people called it mist but it was more like drizzle. Warm enough at 18C and no sunshine to give me a headache. Terrible to have to write such a thing but apparently it's one of the features of shingles.

No mites nor eggs visible today. No, the battle isn't over but it does mean I can relax a bit knowing the little feckers aren't drinking the tribes blood and I can strip out and burn on a more relaxed shedule. I've been doing it daily up till now.

 

[Perris]

Fez's chicks are 10 weeks old today, so it's an opportunity to catch up on some tax, which I haven't paid in a while. Aberglasny has developed some lovely plumage, to my biased eye

and Cadoc is still hanging in there, here sunning her gammy leg.

I need to read up on managing a lame pullet, because it's pretty clear now that whatever damage she sustained in week 2 of life is not going to get better. If anyone has any tips, do please share with me. TIA.

 

[L-plate chicken mum]

Fez's chicks are 10 weeks old today, so it's an opportunity to catch up on some tax, which I haven't paid in a while. Aberglasny has developed some lovely plumage, to my biased eye
View attachment 3935297

and Cadoc is still hanging in there, here sunning her gammy leg.
View attachment 3935298

I need to read up on managing a lame pullet, because it's pretty clear now that whatever damage she sustained in week 2 of life is not going to get better. If anyone has any tips, do please share with me. TIA.

Have you seen this thread? https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/lame-chicken-not-mareks-a-rare-account-of-recovery.1290351/ Might be something useful there?
And yes, Aberglasny has stunning plumage.
Fingers crossed for Cadoc

 

[HiEverybirdy]

I didn't know you were a follower of the blue tip flame cult.

Shucks, wish I could join. Murdering mites by fire sounds satisfying.

We've been dealing with northern fowl mites for the first time in years An important difference from red mites being that northern fowl mites do complete their lifecycles on chickens, so using flamethrowers would result in fried chicken.

The a-holes haven't shown their microscopic faces here since Mitesplosion 2020, a fiasco that left me with an obsessive daily mite-check habit, which is how I found mites on chicken-zero this time before they spread to anybirdy else.

The bird in question? Who else but the Mighty Mitey Andre the Giant Chicken?

When hip problems set in, he started roosting on the floor, so I gave him a tumbling mat. He likes it very much. So do mites.

Our mites loiter on some materials more than others, like plastic and new lumber. Here's a closeup of the waterer in the top-left above Andre. The tiny spots in this photo run around if you blow on them.

I guess I could throw a flame here, but I have a mite-murdering system in place: permethrin dust for coops & chickens, and the most affected bird receives 2-3 courses of the topical treatment that shall not be named. It's a last resort but a miracle for someone like Andre who can't preen thoroughly. Anyway, that's my experience, after many lessons learned during Mitesplosion 2020, which stretched 9 months, a horrible masterclass in northern fowl mites.

This time, it took just 10 days of dusting and cleaning to start finding ≤6 mites daily. I haven't uncovered a single mite in 36 hours and haven't detected any among Stilton's or Merle's groups. It's not over, but the progress is a great relief. Especially for no-longer-itchy Andre.

As has been pointed out on this thread, spare coops are a wonderful thing. Dre's Baes avoided infestation by moving back to their mite-free bachelorette coop for now. Their roost and bumbums got poofs of permethrin dust every 1-2 days.

Here they are triple checking that they can't roost with the big fella before toddling to their coop. Andre doesn't tread them much, so they were able to keep foraging together by day at least. Every morning, Andre dances all the way across the yard to greet them. It's a sight.

It helped that we keep clean coops and do quarterly preventative dusting of roosting areas and nesting boxes, more habits learned from Mitesplosion. I had dusted Andre's mat but must've too light. A problem since rectified.

Best of luck to all those battling these tiny jerks using our chickens as meals without consent

 

[HiEverybirdy]

On the topic of mite checks: Do we all know that tickling a [tame] chicken's bumbum makes them show you their vent? It makes mite checks a breeze. No need to disrupt their day by picking them up.

It also makes them preen reflexively, which is cute.

This video doesn't show vents (seemed a bit explicit). I'm just chipping coatings off new feathers at roost time, which several of our chickens truly enjoy. You can hear Plumb growl when I stop. She demands evening butt fluffs. However, tickle higher, and they totally flash their vent.

 

[HiEverybirdy]

Fez's chicks are 10 weeks old today, so it's an opportunity to catch up on some tax, which I haven't paid in a while. Aberglasny has developed some lovely plumage, to my biased eye
View attachment 3935297

and Cadoc is still hanging in there, here sunning her gammy leg.
View attachment 3935298

I need to read up on managing a lame pullet, because it's pretty clear now that whatever damage she sustained in week 2 of life is not going to get better. If anyone has any tips, do please share with me. TIA.

Aberglasny is very pretty.

Does Cadoc get around okay? Does she get picked on, or are you concerned she's more vulnerable to predators?

All our limping issues to date have been acute, not chronic. When our Carrots broke her toe, she limped in a way that caused a bumble-type callus on her foot that further complicated her gait, but Cadoc's foot looks lovely there, so hopefully that won't be a concern.