I've told most of this to Angela through PM, but decided to post here, too.
Nugget is very slow but she did eat scrambled eggs today. I just noticed she has that sunken look in her comb and around her eyes, not a good sign.
Gloria Jean was on the nest several times, obviously trying to pop out something but she is very bloated. Sammie is lethargic and extremely thin. She was recently wormed with the 5 day Safeguard treatment to get the tougher worms, but the yolk on the roost shelf tells me it's reproductive. Goes in keeping with the losing younger birds over the past year. It's like a housecleaning and eventually, I'll be left with Atlas and his hens, a few old ladies and the handful of Belgian D'Anvers. If I didn't have the two d'Anver roosters, I'd move those little hens in with the old ladies. I may end up with Atlas and a few BR hens, an Old Hens' Home with d'Anvers included and I do plan to have guineas again some day for tick control and watch dogs (in addition to an actual dog, I told my husband).
What's surprising is Tiny. She isn't herself for the last few days and I wonder if the other hens hurt her in some way. She usually is a PITA every morning asking for her separate pile of scratch in her little cup that hangs in front of her special roost bar. She didn't do that and went straight outside to sit on the roost bar in the pen, not eating. I'm not sure what's wrong. She also quit laying and she's one of my best layers. But, I have to remember, she is 5 years old now. I lost my Blue Ameraucana hen, Nora, at about Tiny's age or just over that, a natural death, not egg related. And, though she doesn't lay a blue egg and has obvious Sumatra influence, she is genetically an Ameraucana. So, though we all joke about her living to 20, that may not be the case. She's a royal pain but I don't want her to be sick or hurt.
I have a mental list of about 5 birds I am expecting to lose relatively soon, plus there will be the one or two I don't expect at all. My numbers will plummet if that happens.
C
