Théo and the chickens des Sauches

[Shadrach]

@BDutch
You haven't asked, but I'm going to write anyway.
You are wasting your time and risking the health of your chickens by insisting on trying to tackle red mite with DE.
Sometimes one has to put ones own ideals and notions of natural living to one side and do what's best for the chickens much as one does for humans.
Get some permethrin and treat your coop and birds if necessary.

 

[Shadrach]

@ManueB

https://mikethechickenvet.wordpress.com/2017/02/16/euthanasia-for-backyard-birds/

 

[Perris]

For those of you who have kept invalidated chickens inside your house or a room of your house, how do you handle it ? Do you put something on the floor ?

I use towels on the tiles in the utility room; took this a couple of days ago, it should make clear how it works at least in Chirk's case (of course a mobile chicken would be in a cage with towel).

But I'm not sure this would help in Piou-piou's case.

 

[ManueB]

Thank you for the feedback. We're still hesitating to take her in, because if we keep her in the woodshed it's much easier for her to stay in touch with the other chickens, and we don't go a lot in the house during the day, but she would be cooler.

One thought - which you probably already have done - but would it help prevent fury injury if Gaston’s nails and spots were filed? I know that would be a high drama event, but maybe if they had rounded tips they would do less damage.

Yes, we file his nails, but actually they are really not sharp..and it's not a big deal. I carry him every morning out of the coop to the woodshed on my hands or arm and I can tell

I use towels on the tiles in the utility room; took this a couple of days ago, it should make clear how it works at least in Chirk's case (of course a mobile chicken would be in a cage with towel). View attachment 3557575
But I'm not sure this would help in Piou-piou's case.

Nature has shown her darker side for Chirk.

 

[ManueB]

I wanted to focus on the happy chicken things today. But we did come close to disaster twice so it won't be all roses. Starting this morning : my neighbors came over to help us pick up and bale the hay we give them for their cows. They came with their dogs that they swear don't touch the chickens. At one point we heard a chicken scream and saw Oreo, their border collie, running out of our old barn with an egg in his mouth ! Turns out he must have moved Merle ,who was sitting in there half broody, to pick up a three months old egg I leave on the nest. I couldn't find screaming Merle until I saw her far below perched in a tree at least four meters high and screaming at the top of her lungs! I did threaten and insult the dog and asked it's owner not to bring it again next time.

Léa as we expected weaned the chicks today. I was a little sad to see her pecking them off, especially the smaller pullet that was the only one still very much attached to her. They are much less disciplined than my first hatch and don't stay much together, dispersing around the garden. But they are quite well hidden. I was a bit worried for roost time, especially when I saw Léa going to roost in the nest. I was wondering where they would go. But in fact, when the chicks came in (the first two as they weren't all together) she moved to the roost so I think she must have been saving the place for them .

One thing that happened during the last days, Saturday I think, is that we let Gaston and Théo handle their conflict at roost time. Gaston chased Théo around, and Théo left to the field on the other side of the yard with all his feathers puffed up and making a strange cry I never heard him make before. I called him back to try to get him in the coop and after a long time he came in very scared, and Gaston let him climb on the roost. Then during the day they managed to stay together quietly although Blanche and Nougat are still scared. But Théo acted subdued the next day and now he's perking up and almost looking as if he will pick up a fight again.

Then we had a tiny disaster at roost time that was actually between completely horrifying and a bit funny. I checked on the chickens about half an hour after they were all to bed and discovered Lily completely wrapped up in the fly sticky ribbon trap I had put in the coop, in the one place I thought no chicken would ever reach it . So we had to pull it off very gently and she was full of glue. Tomorrow I will try to rub it off with oil. I hope we don't have to cut too many feathers.

Cannelle and Blanche spend a lot of time on this perch, not one of their favorite, to avoid Gaston.

picking the hay and bringing it to the baling engine that stays on the road.

Miscellaneous: my friend's partner that was here last week is from Iran and he brought us lots of cool Iranian stuff to eat. This is gaz angabin, a type of nougat made with a sap type substance produced by an insect that lives on a specific tree, the angabin, a mountain tamarisk. It tastes a bit like the greek mastic but more subtle.

 

[BDutch]

@BDutch
You haven't asked, but I'm going to write anyway.
You are wasting your time and risking the health of your chickens by insisting on trying to tackle red mite with DE.
Sometimes one has to put ones own ideals and notions of natural living to one side and do what's best for the chickens much as one does for humans.
Get some permethrin and treat your coop and birds if necessary.

I won’t mention it again in the future on this thread because I respect you and don’t want to argue with you. But I’m not convinced (yet) that it doesn’t work. I don’t have any birds with respiratory problems or other health problems.
I also know DE its not the easy way out but so far its seems to work.

 

[Perris]

Nature has shown her darker side for Chirk

It has, but he hasn't given up yet, so I haven't either. Nor have I given up on the possibility of recovery: This morning he seemed to have declined overnight, but this evening he seems to have turned a corner. At last feed he was actually trying to get up. And the tremors - which have always been intermittent - seem more infrequent.

And if it turns out to be a false dawn, we'll take comfort from the 4 glorious years he had before he was struck down with this.

 

[MaryJanet]

MB, when I have to keep a chicken inside, I also bring in a friend for her to talk to. I'm lucky because I can use one of the concrete floored sleepouts, which are quite large 8m2 or thereabouts, and spread sawdust if the chickens will be in there all the time. It seems unfair for them to stand on concrete all day long. I also give treats several times a day to relieve boredom. Also, I recently learnt how much Christa and Joyce like a mirror.

When it's over and they can go outside again, it's quite easy to shovel up the sawdust and clean the concrete floor.

 

[Shadrach]

It has, but he hasn't given up yet, so I haven't either. Nor have I given up on the possibility of recovery: This morning he seemed to have declined overnight, but this evening he seems to have turned a corner. At last feed he was actually trying to get up. And the tremors - which have always been intermittent - seem more infrequent.

And if it turns out to be a false dawn, we'll take comfort from the 4 glorious years he had before he was struck down with this.

Good to read Chirk is showing some signs of recovery.

 

[ManueB]

It has, but he hasn't given up yet, so I haven't either.

Amazing that he's still fighting considering all he's been through in a short time. I'm in awe of chickens will to live.
************
Léa was very tired and weak this morning. It may be the aftermath of the five weeks taking care of the chicks after three weeks sitting, or maybe getting back to laying, or the hormones. Now she's lost her broody fluff she looks almost tiny, and like she is lost and doesn't know what to do. After she laid, she stayed in the woodshed resting on a roost for about an hour, then went to rest in the irises. In the afternoon she was more active and spent a lot of time crying at Gaston. Curiously, she is now afraid of the two black pullets, who are at the bottom of the hierarchy and that she kept bullying while she was with the chicks, but still dominant over the white leghorns.
I gave her a scrambled egg this morning and this afternoon everyone had minced meat. Our old neighbor gave us some that his daughter cooks for him and that he doesn't eat, and we end up giving it to the chickens .

Bad news this evening. Piou-piou spent the day in the crate apart from 2xabout one hour supervised ranging in the garden. But when I tended her wound before roosting it had opened and doubled in size. My only guess is that she has been pecking at it the whole day. I'm really at loss what to do now. Maybe you can find someone who could sew her an apron to her measure ? The one we bought just doesn't fit her, she can't move with it.

Théo got chased by Gaston several times today. The beginning of the video is the unusual sound (for him) that he makes.

Blanche.

Blanche and Léa. Unlikely but Léa has always hung a bit around the ex-batts.

Napping while it rained for five minutes.

Chipie is still broody, it's now 23 days, and locking her out of the coop the while day while I treated for mites yesterday did not work . I guess we are going to have to use harsher solutions.

One good thing : cleaning glue from Lily's feathers was a breeze. She had already managed to clean some preening and it went off very well with sunflower oil

I still have hopes this dude is a dudette / pullet .

Found the first leghorn outdoor secret nest by luck with four eggs.

Léa resting in the Iris. She will have extra protein for the next ten days.

Merle eats the linden tree flowers! It's swarming with bees and all kind of insects it makes a constant buzzing noise from dawn to evening!