The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[Shan30]

thats wonderful!  keep us posted on how she is doing.  are you worried about her wounds or do you feel she is on the mend?   Now you get to feed her lots of fattening and strenthening food.  Is the flock treating her as a "new" hen or leaving her alone?

All of the wounds I found last night were either totally closed up or well on their way, dry and had no temperature difference. There was no sign of infection so I'm not too concerned. She was very difficult to examine though so I will keep checking her out.

Almost everyone was roosting last night and they were still pretty sleepy this morning(lucky bums) so I really couldn't tell you how they are treating her but ill find out this evening. There are lots of places to run and hide so she should be fine.

I like "Phoenix", was also thinking "free bird" you know Lynyrd Skynyrd lol

 

[TipihlowLadies]

Is there a wormer that can be mixed in the water for self service.

 

[jsmith2952]

Hi all, I posted a few months ago about my hen's missing feathers and my concern for lice, and feasther pickers. In the deduction process I did find a case of lice on another hen (not on the one with the missing neck feathers). All the hens were treated with DE and were given a dust bath with DE and wood as. As far as i can tell, the lice has pretty much cleared up, but upon the closer inspection, i noticed both the girl with the lice and the one with the missing neck feathers were a little chewed up looking. I figured it was the third girl and out of desperation used blu-kote because I wasnt 100% sure it was feather picking and didn't want to prematurely cull. Well, the girl who had the lice looks great, while the original problem girl looks worse. She is now missing feathers all down her chest and under her wings. Her vent is fine--still very fluffy and no obvious nits, but her feathers, the ones in the blu-kote area are still being bitten to little bloody stubs. The feather pins on her chest and under her wings look like moult but she's such a disaster its hard to tell. Could it be possible that she's pecking her own feathers off? Could she have an anxiety disorder? Could it be something else entirely? I feel at a complete loss here. I just did another full body search on all three girls and there is no obvious evidence of lice or mites. The hen in question also lays weird eggs that range from mid brown to light brown,are often bumpy, and she recently laid an egg inside an egg. She is otherwise behaving normally.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Leahs Mom]

@jsmith2952

I have a question or 2. I'll just start with one for now.

How many chickens do you have?

 

[jsmith2952]

Three.

 

[Leahs Mom]

Okay. Three.

A few more questions:

-Are they in a run or coop during the day...or do they get to range around in a yard?
-How much space are they usually in? (Measurements approximate.)
-Among the 3 is there a definite pecking order? Where does she fall in the pecking order? Are they mainly amicable or do they squabble some?

 

[jsmith2952]

Their coop is about 10 sq feet. Their run is about 40 sq ft. I let them out everyday from about noon until dusk-- depends on when the eggs are finished being laid. They free range my bavckyard , which is a little less than 1\4 acre. In the pecking order she has always been the top, although with that being said, it has always been amicable, and one of the three is sort of a lone wolf anyway.they spend a few hours each day grooming, often each other. Every now and again, I'll see one of the two pull on the problem hen's neck feathers and she'll let them to a point--when she's had enough she sort of bawks and they'll leave her alone...

 

[Leahs Mom]

When you look at her skin, does it appear to have a rash or dryness...of just normal chicken skin?

 

[jsmith2952]

Just normal skin. No down at all. Of course now that I blu- koted (which I swore I wouldn't do) I can't really tell. There was never an broken skin or abrasion, just feathers pecked down to little stubs with blue\black blood tips

 

[Leahs Mom]

Well...I hope someone else has something to suggest. It just sounds to me like classic feather picking among the flock. When a molt happens the feathers should come back in. This won't happen until after molt with regrowth of the feathers.

An "old time" chicken keeper told us that he top-dresses their feed with lard as it helps skin and feather health. I've always remembered that. We have a good old-fashioned butcher shop that only sells meats from local farms and renders their own lard. So I purchase it from them, melt some, and put some in the feed perhaps once a week or so - more in the winter.

If it was my girl and I didn't think that there were current lice or mites, I'd try to protect her from the rest of the flock for a bit and give her some extra animal based fat (lard) and animal based protein (ground meat works well) and try to help her rebuild herself.