The road less traveled...back to good health! They have lice, mites, scale mites, worms, anemia, gl

[Beekissed]

gosh, go to bed or go to work and come back and ya'll have run on for 8 or 10 pages! Love it! And Granny Bee, love all your chat, your wit, your advice; thank you sooo much for sharing!

Got one old Welsummer hen checked yesterday; the one with the impacted foot gland; had a little bit of dirt in it, but loose and easy to clean out, so washed it, peroxide and some more antibiotic cream (more a just in case kind of thing). Definitely lice/mites. Yay, should be picking up Nu Stock this weekend. so next week can really get started getting rid of these darn things. Will say she doesn't have them as bad as the roo; he definitely has a horrible case of them.

I'm glad you caught it sooner than later! I'll be doing periodic checks on this flock as well to see if they have become re-infested with the lice and mites. Winter time is the worst time for these kinds of parasites.

 

[Wax Myrtle]

I have to admit, I come inside if my girls get a toad or tree frog... I just can't handle the sound they make when they Pop! :shudder:

 

[aaggjg]

Ahh the crows are out in full force this morning!! Music to my ears...
Who ever thought I'd be saying that!!!!

So I re nu-stocked Tank. I see little feather nubs coming in and the skin by her vent does not look as red... There was a layer flaking off so I'm assuming it is healing and sloughing off ... Her neck is all grey shafts of pin feathers ... Poor thing almost looks like a naked neck she came out of the coop right away this morning ... She has been waiting to come out. So I'm going to take this as a sign that she is feeling a little better and she seems to be eating a little more today!! I gave them some scrambled eggs this morning to boost her protein .... I keep cutting back on their FF ... And they still don't eat it all. I'm only giving them 2 scoops and I have 9 hens (3 bantams, 3 teenagers & 3 yearish olds) doesn't seem like much food. Hmmmm. I did notice 2 of my original girls eat some pine shaving in the run the other day!! This is strange.... They've been on shavings their whole lives and never eaten it. Not to mention there was plenty of FF in their feeder. My 3 yearish old LF have all stopped laying while my 2 yr old bantams continue.....it's all very interesting and I learn something new each day.

 

[aaggjg]

Right now I can see them up in the coop "foraging" in the deep litter.  This is this flock's first experience with a soil floor in a coop and I'm thinking there are many more bugs in the DL for them than there has ever been before.  What a wonderful way to provide that bug protein...just imagine the bugs and worms that come to feed on the manure and the litter material.  I saw a toad outside the coop a couple of weeks back and I thought, "You better hop on out of here, son..NOT the place to be right now!" 

 

Hahaha! I have a ton of lizards in my yard and one was sunbathing one day... Almost stepped on it a bunch of times. I thought you better get out of here or the girls will get you. Well they ignored him.... Then an hour or so later there was a mad game of tag going on and my GLW had said lizard and was beating it on the ground trying to break it up while fending off the other chickens! Yep no place for lizards either

 

[Beekissed]

I'm using three scoops for 11 DP birds and they leave a little overnight and eat the remainder for breakfast in the morning...not much is left but enough to give them a snack in the morning.

 

[colburg]

Quote: Bee, have you thought about educating these folks? Show them non-swollen-footed, non-drippy-butt, non-lice-infested, healthy, laying, fertile, scratching, bug-hunting, seed-foraging, hawk-dodging, solid-poopin, cock-a-doodle-doin chickens and roosters and tell them that you'll teach them how they can have that too. Don't do their fishin for them, but teach them to fish.

I'm only on page 32 so if this has already been suggested, my apologies.

colburg

 

[aaggjg]

I'm using three scoops for 11 DP birds and they leave a little overnight and eat the remainder for breakfast in the morning...not much is left but enough to give them a snack in the morning. 

 

Oh ok. I thought I remembered you saying you gave them 4 scoops and they free range ... So I was thinking my poor cooped up guys aren't even eating 1/2 that and only out for an hour or 2 a day on average. I do give them loads of greens each day too ... So maybe that explains the the leftovers !

 

[armorfirelady]

The Gnarly Bunch have been haunting the bird feeders and cleaning up any spilled seed. I can just hear the morning doves up in the trees right now saying, "Who in the world invited THEM to the party!!!"

Right now I can see them up in the coop "foraging" in the deep litter. This is this flock's first experience with a soil floor in a coop and I'm thinking there are many more bugs in the DL for them than there has ever been before. What a wonderful way to provide that bug protein...just imagine the bugs and worms that come to feed on the manure and the litter material. I saw a toad outside the coop a couple of weeks back and I thought, "You better hop on out of here, son..NOT the place to be right now!"

I was out in the coop last night turning hay after the hens had wonderful fun spreading the 3/4 bale of hay I left in there. I then decided to go in the veggie garden and turn the leaves I had put in there. Lots of worms and bugs hiding under those leaves and the hens made a bee line for the garden when I was done. I am guessing thats where I will find them today when I get home from work.

And there is no chance of them getting cold in their run with all that hay they spread around. They could make hay forts for cold days lol I wont need to add any hay for a LONG time.......

 

[Mtn Laurel]

The Gnarly Bunch have been haunting the bird feeders and cleaning up any spilled seed. I can just hear the morning doves up in the trees right now saying, "Who in the world invited THEM to the party!!!"

Right now I can see them up in the coop "foraging" in the deep litter. This is this flock's first experience with a soil floor in a coop and I'm thinking there are many more bugs in the DL for them than there has ever been before. What a wonderful way to provide that bug protein...just imagine the bugs and worms that come to feed on the manure and the litter material. I saw a toad outside the coop a couple of weeks back and I thought, "You better hop on out of here, son..NOT the place to be right now!"

My gals are doing the same thing. We have a lawnmower with a bag attachment but we normally don't use the bag. Had DH put on the bag and "mow" the leaves. Not only did it chop the leaves, it also managed to mow what little grass was under them, making a mix of dry and green matter. We filled the coop, the run, and parts of their favorite scratch spots with this and they're loving it. I do think you're right in that the leaves/grass/manure mulch is bringing in the bugs and worms. They sure do seem to be finding something in there!

Now that it's colder I've gone to keeping the FF on my unheated but enclosed back porch. The temp there never freezes but is much lower than in the house and warmer than the coop. I'm finding that the FF will continue to ferment just fine and it doesn't get as "sharp" as it does in the heat. Guessing it isn't as quickly fermented but it's still doing the job.

 

[aoxa]

You know Bee, you are so right and so valuable to this forum and people like me trying to learn. I feel so lost at times. Oh, I wanted to share this: my cousin who is 77yrs old called me yesterday. She was raised in Pennsylvania and her grandparents owned a farm and raised among other things, chickens. She was excited to hear about my chickens and told me some stories of when she was a kid. I can't tell you how intrigued I was. Anyway, she said her grandfather, knowing the grand kids would be coming to visit for Easter, would color the chicks that were going to hatch. NOT after they were hatched mind you, BEFORE they hatched. He would use a needle and syringe to inject dye into the egg before the chick hatched. When the chicks were hatched they would come out all different colors, blue, green and such. Then, of course, as they grew the color would be lost. Have you ever heard of anyone doing that? She talked all afternoon about her memories of her childhood and chickens. I was amazed at her experiences. And I found out, she killed chickens at the age of 7!!  Why do farmers let such young children do that? When I asked her how she dealt with doing that at such a young age, she said, " I don't know. I just did it". My point to this, or one of them is, what a great gift it is to be raised in the country around animals, and be taught about life and death in such a natural way. Those experiences can never be taught from a book. So thank you Bee for sharing your knowledge and giving us that base from which to grow from.

You know Gale, I think the reason you and I are so sensitive to ending a life of a chicken, is because we didn't get to experience these things at a young age. My father coddled me. That dead bunny on the side of the road? Napping of course. This alone has left me crippled many times when losing a beloved pet. Having this farm has toughened me up. Dealing with death is important. I still can't kill them myself, but there are people living with me that will if need be. However, chicks die.. Chickens die (somethings without warning), and cats get hit by cars.

My father killed chickens at a young age and the only negative he can remember is having to catch them. Kids are remarkably strong. We need to stop coddling them. No the cat didn't go live on a farm. He died. These are things that we have to tell our kids. They probably can handle death better than you or I.