The Evolution of Atlas: A Breeding (and Chat) Thread

[h2oratt]

I Am interested in a pHone number

He did text me back and said he would be at the Lodi show in January. I have been following another chicken breeder on YouTube, his breeding info is interesting. He breeds American game birds. Last name troviano. Has advice for show chicken breeders. Not sure I want to get that serious.

 

[h2oratt]

Gosh I thought I submitted this post, but here it is in Drafts, at least the first part of it.
I will, Cheryl, keep you posted on new stock, but it may be awhile.

The hits just keep coming....new issue. Athena is in a bad way, fly strike per my video on YT. Why now? It's not hot outside, very few flies anywhere, especially in the barn. I had looked for wounds under her wings because of Mace being so clumsy trying to breed that huge gal, but there never were any. The problem, however, turned out to be on the back flank down low. This video tells the whole story and update below in this post:

The update from today: In examining Athena again after a couple of days of healing, I now see what that darkened skin really was. Apparently, she had some sort of wound there, prob from Mace's clumsy breeding attempts of a bantam rooster on large fowl hen. And a fly deposited eggs in the cut/scrape, whatever it was that was probably bleeding a bit. The entire darkened area, slightly larger than a silver dollar, was where they were eating the skin and it was bleeding slowly and drying on the skin. It has now shrunken back and I see they got through the skin into the immediate muscle by a bit, probably not into her body cavity, likely were just under the skin itself. So, she has exposed muscle. But she is weak on that side, which I don't quite understand, like the leg is stiff. No sign of infection, has had two PenG injections, wormed internally and externally with two different wormers because Invermectin gets external and some internal, Valbazen only internal worms. Not sure if fly larvae are even susceptible to either, but it's a desperate move to attack the larvae from all fronts to make sure they're dead/gone. I may attempt to get a picture of the wound now that she's on the healing side of it, IF she actually does heal and survive the stress of all that.

Now, Forrest is showing weakness on his left leg. His hips are not against the body, but at a slight angle and his left leg was shaking and he kept tripping. Reminded me of Hector's shaky leg he had for quite awhile that was injured jumping off a high spot. Poor little Forrest, he just tries to keep up. Gave him baby aspirin.

Bash is still off and what on earth is happening here? And my husband is not doing well at all, not much help to me, he just drags himself out of a chair to do some things and help me, but he's as unsteady as Forrest on his feet. Plus I am in the middle of a huge afghan crochet project as well as trying to quilt a large lap quilt and there is NOT ENOUGH HOURS in the day (yes, I yelled) or enough of me to go around. On top of all that, I make content for YouTube and I am tired and stressed.

Hang in there. I am dreading my husband next knee replacement.

 

[speckledhen]

Hang in there. I am dreading my husband next knee replacement.

He did text me back and said he would be at the Lodi show in January. I have been following another chicken breeder on YouTube, his breeding info is interesting. He breeds American game birds. Last name troviano. Has advice for show chicken breeders. Not sure I want to get that serious.

I'm not wanting to get serious with breeding, either, but I do like my eye candy.
Best wishes for your husband's recovery. Mine needs it, but his back is worse and the shots they gave him about 2 weeks ago helped for exactly 24 hours. No one seems to have any answers and have been experimenting on him for over 30 years now.

 

[h2oratt]

I'm not wanting to get serious with breeding, either, but I do like my eye candy.
Best wishes for your husband's recovery. Mine needs it, but his back is worse and the shots they gave him about 2 weeks ago helped for exactly 24 hours. No one seems to have any answers and have been experimenting on him for over 30 years now.

So sad. I do not do well with pain. Prayers for you both.

 

[speckledhen]

The two were at it again for the 3rd day. Now, Axel has dried blood all over his head and a swollen pinched wattle. He's separated in the hospital cage. All the roosters are sick of them fighting and keep trying to break it up, but it isn't working. I'm close to having to execute Axel since he seems to be the aggressor here who just won't let it go. Next, someone will lose an eye. I really don't want to put him down because of this-he's sweet with us, never has bitten me even in a fit of adrenaline- but I have now two pens being occupied by a single bird each and I do not want to separate him into the last one that I can cordon off from the others. I can sell off him with two of the young girls, maybe Wren and Phoebe, but I don't want to get rid of Phoebe. She is so unusual. I could let him go with Wren who is a cantankerous little wench, but he currently looks a total mess.

 

[h2oratt]

Sorry for the rooster wars. We are down to two roosters. Both are very nice. We thinned down the flock from all the chickens I inherited..

I knew I wanted less animals to take care of during my DH surgery. He had a total knee replacement on Wednesday.. I am in charge of all animals.

We have 8 dogs, 3 barn cats, around 20 chickens.

Barn cat would not use it front leg for three days so I had to take him to the vet. 450 dolllars later, they don’t really know what is wrong. No broken bone or dislocation. Maybe an abscess starting in the shoulder area. They put him on abx. He is lovely cat. We rescued him from the field next door when his mother got killed on our road. He was good at the vet. I never get to spend with him because of the dogs. Hopefully he will make a full recovery.

 

[speckledhen]

I'd probably have to let the chickens go and start over with guineas if it was just me. They're more independent and find more of their own food, plus the males and females pair up so no separating the males with their own hens. Just no eggs through the winter with guineas. It's difficult to have it all on you alone so paring down the responsibilities is surely helpful.
Poor kitty, hope he recovers from whatever it is. He was lucky to be rescued by you!

Edited for wrong spelling-typing too fast never works out that well for me, LOL

 

[speckledhen]

Since this is oftentimes just a chat thread, here is a crocheted shawl I just finished.
The shawl (called a Virus Shawl, believe it or not...means it grows like a virus with row repeats) is complete, just need to weave in the tails at the beginning and the end because I did it all from one of the Mandala Bonus Bundles, or part of one-it's a huge yarn cake of about 1100 yards-a pretty thin #3 wt yarn, in the colorway "Chewy". It's very neutral toned with the last row being a light grayish blue, not sure why that doesn't show up, probably the quilt back that it's on. It's super lightweight, not sure what I'll do with it, maybe do a giveaway on my YT channel, who knows?

I just did a triangle scarf/shawl (hybrid, works either way) with a different Lion Brand Mandala cake that has 10% wool, 75% acrylic and 15% nylon, very warm, made a matching beanie, too. That one shows up almost brown, but it's actually in shades of gray. I gotta get a better background because that one is just the back of one of my quilts; my camera angle is not wide enough-it would be if I stood on a ladder over it, I guess, but standing next to the bed, it's usually too close to get the entire subject when it's wide.

 

[getaclue]

It's a beautiful pattern.

 

[speckledhen]

It really is beautiful, gave me some trouble, had to try three different written patterns to get one that was mostly understandable. I read it one way, they mean it another, LOL. But, it was worth the effort.

Mina is seizing a lot more now. She's had four we have witnessed and how many more that we didn't? Same as Carly years ago, seizures became so frequent that she could not eat or drink without triggering one. Guess she is about ready to exit, the last Belgian D'Anver after 12 years with them. She is approaching the 12 1/2 mark so she's had a good run.

Adding that today, she had another very violent seizure where she flopped all over the cage, didn't just freeze, spread her wings and shake. She can still eat and drink, but she has had a total of five we've observed and probably more that we haven't.