Shetland Hen FINALLY laid her first egg!😃

[Jenni Hen]

Thank you!
I was given a dozen of those amazing greeny blue eggs and I've picked out some names from a census list but now I've to wait until next month to get the hens. The Shetlands and Orkeneys were only given to Scotland at the end of the fifteenth century (to settle a debt) so a lot of the names and ways there are still Scandinavian. I like Breta, Inga, Sinnie, Geilis.

I was also tempted by some Sebrights- so pretty! I guess if I met some Silkies they'd tempt me too, but I want to have enough eggs for baking.

 

[LadiesAndJane]

So, I sold Fiona back in July as I was focusing more on the Silkies and my new job required me to scale back on the chicken numbers due to time constraints.
In the meantime, the person who bought Fiona called me last week and asked me if I would like her back as he was just unable to get her integrated into his flock. And yes I did refer him to BYC and all the excellent integration articles here! Fiona went with another hen as I never sell them singly, apparently the other girl is doing just fine. He also said he only got one egg from her the past 2 months.
Poor Fiona must have been terribly picked on and stressed. We got her back last night.
Fiona got the full spa treatment today: Bath, blow dry, nail trim, dose of worm and mite medicine, wound debridement, antibiotic ointment. Now she is out enjoying the grass for a bit.
Not sure where she will end up with the other birds, but will be in quarantine for now.
She has a home here for life.

 

[JedJackson]

So, I sold Fiona back in July as I was focusing more on the Silkies and my new job required me to scale back on the chicken numbers due to time constraints.
In the meantime, the person who bought Fiona called me last week and asked me if I would like her back as he was just unable to get her integrated into his flock. And yes I did refer him to BYC and all the excellent integration articles here! Fiona went with another hen as I never sell them singly, apparently the other girl is doing just fine. He also said he only got one egg from her the past 2 months.
Poor Fiona must have been terribly picked on and stressed. We got her back last night.
Fiona got the full spa treatment today: Bath, blow dry, nail trim, dose of worm and mite medicine, wound debridement, antibiotic ointment. Now she is out enjoying the grass for a bit.
Not sure where she will end up with the other birds, but will be in quarantine for now.
She has a home here for life.View attachment 3264736View attachment 3264739View attachment 3264735View attachment 3264737View attachment 3264740

Poor Fiona! I'm glad she's back to a caring and knowledgeable home. Looks like she needs it.

 

[BeetaLiK]

Congratulations! hope all goes well with your chickens!

 

[Jenni Hen]

Poor thing! So glad you have her back where she'll be safe.

I collected three little Shetlands on Saturday. One of them will be similar to Fiona when she's grown up. They're 8 weeks old now.
It's my first time integrating new birds so I've been reading the posts about integration - people have contributed a lot of good advice and I'm very grateful to them.
However, I wasn't expecting that the grown-up Sussexes would be spooked and leave home! They're allowed through the hole in the fence into next door's garden to help dig up the weeds; and they stayed there all day and kept well away from the Shetlands whenever they needed to come back.
The New Red Hampshire must have been unsettled too because she became aggressive, picking on the two lowest-ranking birds so persistently, that I put her in a coop on her own last night. I hope she's more settled today.

 

[LadiesAndJane]

Poor thing! So glad you have her back where she'll be safe.

I collected three little Shetlands on Saturday. One of them will be similar to Fiona when she's grown up. They're 8 weeks old now.
It's my first time integrating new birds so I've been reading the posts about integration - people have contributed a lot of good advice and I'm very grateful to them.
However, I wasn't expecting that the grown-up Sussexes would be spooked and leave home! They're allowed through the hole in the fence into next door's garden to help dig up the weeds; and they stayed there all day and kept well away from the Shetlands whenever they needed to come back.
The New Red Hampshire must have been unsettled too because she became aggressive, picking on the two lowest-ranking birds so persistently, that I put her in a coop on her own last night. I hope she's more settled today.

Yes, integration can be very complex and unsettling to the existing flock dynamics. Just make sure you take plenty of time integrating the new ones, especially since they’re still quite young, into the existing flock. My experience with this one bird is that this breed is very docile, akin to Silkies in their temperament. I had Fiona in with my Silkies previously and I probably will end up integrating her back in with them as opposed to trying to integrate her in with my layer flock.
I would love to see photos of your new Shetland Hens!
Being a land race I know they come in different colors, the black with the brown being dominant though.

 

[Jenni Hen]

Thank you for that advice. TBH I'm a little impatient because, unfortunately and unexpectedly, I've to have eye surgery on 4th October and have to plan for managing afterwards. This morning they are watching the other hens and I realised that they might not even have seen or heard adult birds before, depending on which pen they were raised in. It's a lot for them to learn! Yes, they do seem friendly and level-headed. The pesonalities are quite different. Geilish (the light one) is shy and retiring, Brita (the brown one) is agile and quick to learn, and Sinnie (the very dark one) is calm and confident and seems to be the leader.

I asked for lighter colours (so I can see them under the hedge!) and have the only three lighter-coloured pullets that hatched from a batch of 45 eggs. (I don't know how many cockerels there were.)

 

[Jenni Hen]

 

[LadiesAndJane]

View attachment 3265838

They are all so beautiful!
Where did you get yours?

 

[Jenni Hen]

I think they're utterly beautiful but of course I'm biased!
I've always been fascinated by feathers - the amazing intricate structure and that each one is different - but I've only been able to keep chickens from a couple of years ago, so I'm still going 'oh wow!' whenever I look at their plumage.

I'm really lucky because I'm only about ten miles from someone who breeds them, and it's just off the main road into York.
https://www.greentreefarmshetlands.co.uk/our-livestock/shetland-hens/

I was getting worried about them yesterday because only the brown one was lively. The others were moping about. I twigged that they were probably cold - the temperature has dropped here, to about 10 C ie low 50s F and those two can't work out how to get up to the coop so I made them a sheltered nest in the run and they snuggled up in the back of it. Today they seemed better but still very quiet. I think there's an awful lot for them to take in compared with where they were before. Today I changed things to make it easier to access the coop and tomorrow I'll replace the coop ladder with a ramp. Brita loves going up the ladder so I'll put it over something so that she can run up it and jump off