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

[Chickmate]

PUMPKIN PROBLEMS.... PUMPKIN PROBLEMS...

Okay...I brought home a batch of free pumpkins and put them in the basement. Was going to use them throughout the early winter. Today I was bringing out some that were beginning to get rotten and found that some had THE EVIL BLACK MOLD growing in excess inside.

Not all of them had it - just some.

I'm going to haul all the pumpkins back up out of the basement as I have to clean up the floor before I get a mold problem down there which doesn't exist now or previously.

I'm going to put them all outside on the garden as compost I guess. So far my birds haven't wanted to give any pumpkin the time of day. Raw, soft and deteriorating, frozen-refrozen-softened, cooked.... they just don't seem to like them at all.

Any thoughts?

My birds don't like them either. The other day I saw three perfectly good big pumpkins someone had set out for garbage pickup so I stopped and picked them up for the chickens. I broke one open thinking the girls would dive in to it but a week later not a seed has been touched. Someone here mentioned grinding the seeds up so I'm going to put all the seeds in the food processor and see if they will eat them that way. Might also add them to the FF.

 

[Bogtown Chick]

My spoiled birds turned their noses up at pumpkin this fall too. I did blend some pumpkin innards with a little apple sauce and oatmeal and that did help...but they didn't really finish it off like they were crazy about it...I don't know....

 

[Melabella]

Just sharing our His-N-Her spa treatments. Frederic didn't sit down this time because he was feeling very important as he watched over his hen. He seems to be improving (knock on wood) but unfortunately Inga is unable to put any weight on her leg. Going to give her a few more days. The two are happy as long as they're together. I don't have a safe space in the coop to separate them from the others, so they're staying in a huge dog crate in the mud room at night and then they get the coop and run to themselves during the day when the others are free ranging. Keep your fingers crossed Inga heals up - I really don't want to cull her.

Wishing Inga all the best. I do love how he is standing guard over her... Bulldogma,, even your pictures are unique, and entertaining I hope she is better sooon...

Good Luck,
MB

 

[pigeonguy]

Well...tried a little experiment this evening but it doesn't have anything to do with the Gnarly Bunch.

I deboned a 20 lb turkey in preparation for an early Thanksgiving meal tomorrow. We changed the holiday to suit our family's schedule.

I'd never deboned a turkey, though I have with a chicken. It was somewhat more bulky but easier because I wasn't stripping all the bones, just the bigger and bulkier ones. Gonna do a Julia Child on the thing! Going to stuff the legs and thighs with dressing and the chest cavity and breast cubby too. Gonna cook it breast down until the last 10 min. and then going to open that cooking bag and flip it to brown the skin up.

Took the back, neck and organs and put them in a crock pot tonight to cook down and be ready for making stuffing and gravy in the morning.

First time I ever used a hammer to make Thanksgiving dinner.....

What was the hammer for.

 

[Beekissed]

Breaking the end of the leg bone so that I could remove the bone without cutting the skin in that area. If you cut the skin, it will shrink back from the meat as it cooks and leave the ends of the meat dry. After it cooks you can cut that piece off and slip the thin bone-like tendons out of the piece of meat and you are left with a leg that is all meat, no tendons or slivers of ick to break your teeth upon.

Pretty cool stuff...watched a chef do it in a chicken in 18 seconds...deboned the whole blamed bird in that time!

 

[Beekissed]

Yipee Kiaayy - It's Bee's Blog of the Day!!

Has anyone looked at the hits on this blog site lately???

I noted 7000 tonight!!! Dog, I am in awe of the amount and quality of work done on this site even yet!

Your skill and wisdom in knowing that folks needed this kind of site for reference is astounding. Apparently folks are viewing it, so that must mean they like the info and the format~all praise to BDM for her timely site creation and the content therein!

Please tell me you are going to put the pics of your soaking chicks on the site....too cute to not put those birds up there.

 

[Beekissed]

Pic of winter dusting goin' on with the Gnarly Bunch. They are loving the FF long about right now...I think the bottom fell out of the bug forage because they are practically licking the trough every day now, no matter how much feed I put in it.



The two barred rocks and the little red New Hamp are now in molt, so all eggs have ceased...what few that were.

That's Katy with the one feather sticking out of her tail on the right. Fanny, the other BR, has no tail feathers right now. Little Red has finally stopped laying, so I expect she will molt off soon...she really needs it, her feathers look old.

The white queens are still showing signs of the Better NS application on their saddle feathers where I handled them with greasy hands...really shows up on those white birds and it doesn't appear to be wearing off anytime soon. Guess I took care of that pesky problem of having to place Bag Balm over the NS to get it to stick better.

Caught the Bat sneaking into the Better Butter can today to put some on a wound on her arm again....

She must have liked the results from the last time. I placed some on my #2 son this week for an infected, ingrown toenail that he had been treating with epsom salt soaks, but was still extremely tender and red. The next day he reported that it no longer hurt to walk on it and that it didn't hurt when I palpated it. Quick acting stuff! He was pretty impressed...seems he'd been dealing with this thing for some time now with epsom soaks and cutting away the nail, expressing pus from it, etc.

Next week I think I'll slather on more of the butter on the chook's legs and feet but this time I'll hold them with clean hands and have the Bat put the treatment on. I think a weekly treatment this time to keep on top of these mites should do the trick. Until I see all smooth, beautiful scales on every leg, they will keep getting the butter. Just because I have plenty and I know how good it must feel to have those legs moisturized and massaged if there is any mites left under the scales.

 

[flagirl]

I tried freezing 1/2 large pumpkin, live is warm florida, and thawed it for thanksgiving for the birds. they ate the seeds, but left the rest. last month I gave the other 1/2 just as it was and by day 3 they had pretty much finished it.

 

[galanie]

I've got a Cochin girl limping right now. I'm pretty sure she just landed wrong at some point, because there's no wounds on her at all. I let her take a little Epsom soak, and she hung out in the house, in a plastic tub full of shavings.
I think the best you can do is make sure she sits still for a while, and takes it easy. I feel the same as you, I don't want to cull such a pretty chicken, especially before she's even laying or fully matured.

I would be concerned about an apparently lame hen but it depends on the severity. I have a gimpy mutt rooster that came up lame all the sudden and never could figure out what was wrong. I just let him be and eventually he quit limping. I watched and in spite of the bad leg, he was getting around fine and even able to do the deed (How? I'm still not sure). Since then I've had another start to limp but this time it was obvious: bumblefoot. That treated, she's fine now. Then another mutt started limping. I checked her well, found nothing wrong. She's still getting around and laying so I'm not going to stress over it. After the first round of lameness I lowered all the roosts and made sure nothing in the coop could be causing it barring oddball accidents.

Point being, lameness might not be a reason to cull. I know Bee or someone else will correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[Bulldogma]

I would be concerned about an apparently lame hen but it depends on the severity. I have a gimpy mutt rooster that came up lame all the sudden and never could figure out what was wrong. I just let him be and eventually he quit limping. I watched and in spite of the bad leg, he was getting around fine and even able to do the deed (How? I'm still not sure). Since then I've had another start to limp but this time it was obvious: bumblefoot. That treated, she's fine now. Then another mutt started limping. I checked her well, found nothing wrong. She's still getting around and laying so I'm not going to stress over it. After the first round of lameness I lowered all the roosts and made sure nothing in the coop could be causing it barring oddball accidents.
Point being, lameness might not be a reason to cull. I know Bee or someone else will correct me if I'm wrong.

I'm afraid my little hen had a luxating hock joint - looks like the tendon has slipped (the hock slips side to side in the joint

) the bad news is that it will likely never correct itself. I'm going to give her some time. If she can at least get to where she is not in pain and able to get around, I'll keep her. If she is picked off by a predator, then so be it. I know plenty of dogs who are fine with this condition but dogs have 4 legs.

The only reason (aside from being a bit attached to this very sweet-natured girl) for not culling her right now is that she is a rare breed, and a fairly uncommon color for her breed. I'm giving her a few weeks either way, and then I'll decide based on if she's in pain or not. Currently she and her beau are as content as 2 bugs in a rug. They rest with their necks intertwined, and Frederic chases the cat away from his hen (by clucking loudly) whenever it comes near.