Shadrach's Ex Battery and Rescued chickens thread.

[DobieLover]

I think I may have seen this on YouTube last year. The eggs are preserves for some time, is this right?

I'm eating eggs that were laid last summer.
One homesteader said they'd eaten year old eggs.

 

[RoyalChick]

As she said.

Plus they would be killed for pet food if no one rescued them. Can you imagine how wrong that is, they've locked in tiny cages, just for their eggs then killed.

I understand and fully agree with how awful it is. I just feel that while those situations exist, it is not always kinder to the chicken to ‘rescue’ then.
Bring rescued by Shad is very different from being rescued by Shad’s ‘C’.

 

[RoyalChick]

I am with you. And yet I do appreciate Shad in his quest to learn the true soul of The Chicken.

Love the ‘true soul of the chicken’ and I too fully appreciate Shad’s quest.

 

[RoyalChick]

Ahh….don’t we all…


DH said 4 for the yard, I convinced him 5 would be much safer in case anything happened to one of them. It is all I can do not to get the backyard max of 6 here.

I have four. But I noticed different dynamics even when it was 5.
I think 6-8 would be good for my little tribe

 

[Shadrach]

I've loathed too do this but she knows I won't hurt her and I took that picture now.
I have very little chance of doing this in the morning as she's running about as busy as a bee and I'm dashing around with feeding and cleaning out the coop.

@Shadrach

My sleepy cute girl
View attachment 2956339

Can't see anything clear enough to comment on from the picture.

 

[Shadrach]

Shadrach, it's good to see those chickens out and about. Has Lima been the lapsitter in your recent pictures or is that someone else?

Does the dying hen have a name? I tend to name dying birds if they don't have a name already. There's something about burying someone nameless that just doesn't feel right to me.

The group as a whole looks to be faring quite well. How has your new helper been doing?

It's been downright miserable here lately but our daytime highs are supposed to go up about 30 degrees for the next week or so which everyone will enjoy.

There's not much left in the tax fund here so this will have to do for now. This is one of the hatchery pullets from last spring. She went egg bound a few days ago but cleared it on her own. I'm waiting to see a good egg from her. She laid a good egg 2 days ago and then laid a shell less egg very early this morning. She's one of 4 hens laying currently.


View attachment 2956394

Lima doesn't jump onto my lap anymore. I've done my bit for her and she's an independent and rather fiesty hen now far more interested in learning how dig craters like the Legbars and hunting for bugs in the long grass.
One of the wonderful things about chickens is they never say thank you for the things we do for them. This needs a bit of thinking about to understand why it's so wonderful.
Only one other will sit on my lap and that's to give her feet a quick warm up I think; nothing to do with wanting to keep me company.
Two more jump onto my lap but both of those are junior hens hoping that being close to the food source may mean they get an early crack at anything going.
The dying hen won't get buried. There is a small patch in a kind of copice where the dead get left for those that scavenge to eat.

 

[Shadrach]

It does. I am looking forward to watching the allotment birds get their instincts and natural behaviors back. I will also continue to nurture the natural behaviors of the birds in my charge the best I can, short of letting them free range all day unsupervised. Perhaps someday I will live in a stable setting where I can allow that.

They won't get them back. They never lost them. What they haven't had and are not likely to have, is the opportunity to practice them.

 

[RoyalChick]

Lima doesn't jump onto my lap anymore. I've done my bit for her and she's an independent and rather fiesty hen now far more interested in learning how dig craters like the Legbars and hunting for bugs in the long grass.
One of the wonderful things about chickens is they never say thank you for the things we do for them. This needs a bit of thinking about to understand why it's so wonderful.
Only one other will sit on my lap and that's to give her feet a quick warm up I think; nothing to do with wanting to keep me company.
Two more jump onto my lap but both of those are junior hens hoping that being close to the food source may mean they get an early crack at anything going.
The dying hen won't get buried. There is a small patch in a kind of copice where the dead get left for those that scavenge to eat.

None of mine jump on my lap but they do like to settle close to me. I assume I represent safety. That means if I sit I often end up with a chicken on my feet having a bit of a sit down.
Maggie is different - she clearly wishes to communicate something to me but I am too stupid to understand. She will jump up on to my side table and yell at me and then run off to go about her business then come back and yell at me again.

 

[Perris]

There is a small patch in a kind of copice where the dead get left for those that scavenge to eat.

are you not concerned that might attract foxes or rats?

 

[RoyalChick]

Lima doesn't jump onto my lap anymore. I've done my bit for her and she's an independent and rather fiesty hen now far more interested in learning how dig craters like the Legbars and hunting for bugs in the long grass.
One of the wonderful things about chickens is they never say thank you for the things we do for them. This needs a bit of thinking about to understand why it's so wonderful.
Only one other will sit on my lap and that's to give her feet a quick warm up I think; nothing to do with wanting to keep me company.
Two more jump onto my lap but both of those are junior hens hoping that being close to the food source may mean they get an early crack at anything going.
The dying hen won't get buried. There is a small patch in a kind of copice where the dead get left for those that scavenge to eat.

Did you change your approach to burying dead chickens when you moved to the UK Shad?
I remember you buried at least some of them in Catalonia. Maybe it was because you were much closer to those chickens.