|
Been a long time since I posted. Our silkie flock is doing pretty great but the almost 2 months straight of 100deg weather is taking its toll. We are 4 roosters and 8 hens. We’re way over roostered but I work from home and the silkies seem to treat the hens well. No bald backs or anything like that. I was holding one of my Roos yesterday and I felt clumps in his beard. I tugged a little and the feathers pulled right out easy as could be and clumped to the base is what I think are mite eggs  Checked all their beards and they all have it  it’s my fault as we haven’t been cleaning their coops much through the heat. So now we’re dealing with mites. I’ve been going 1 by 1 and pulling the clumps out of their beards. Coops fully cleaned and sanitized, fresh bedding, and a generous dusting of DE. We also have some tick and mite spray I’ll dab under their chins and around their vents with. I’m so sorry babies!
LuckyCat fucked around with this message at 18:34 on Jul 20, 2022 |
#
?
Jul 20, 2022 18:31
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 2, 2024 19:24 |
|
|
Joburg posted:That can work pretty well, I did that with my 4 week old naked neck chicks. They were in the cage in the coop at night, and in an outdoor pen near the coop during the day. I think I moved them back and forth for about a week before I started leaving their pen door open during the day. They followed a couple of the mama hens & chicks around but I still had to round them up at nighttime for a few weeks. Thanks for letting me know about the chickens, we were only planning on getting either one of the types but if they only have a limited amount of each it's good to know not to mix them together. The flock is usually let out during the day and have plenty of room. ChaseSP fucked around with this message at 19:57 on Jul 20, 2022 |
|
#
?
Jul 20, 2022 19:42
|
|
|
We said goodbye to Bella today. She'd been a retired garden hen for three years, 10 months and 12 days and was the most thoughtful and sensible hen of the flock.    Roost in Peace, little featherbundle.
|
|
#
?
Jul 20, 2022 22:55
|
|
|
spookygonk posted:
What a great series of photos for a magnificent and dignified lady  Roost in peace, beautiful Bella
|
|
#
?
Jul 20, 2022 23:24
|
|
|
Beautiful Bella...roost well, lovely lady.
|
|
#
?
Jul 21, 2022 01:11
|
|
|
 Thanks for blessing your home with your calm presence, Bella.
|
|
#
?
Jul 21, 2022 04:57
|
|
|
.
City of Glompton fucked around with this message at 03:22 on Oct 9, 2022 |
|
#
?
Jul 21, 2022 05:35
|
|
|
spookygonk posted:We said goodbye to Bella today. She'd been a retired garden hen for three years, 10 months and 12 days and was the most thoughtful and sensible hen of the flock.  sweet baby
|
|
#
?
Jul 21, 2022 10:32
|
|
|
Fare well on the next stage of your journey, Bella. 
|
|
#
?
Jul 21, 2022 12:10
|
|
|
Bella looks like she was a sweet girl with a lovely home. Rest well.
|
|
#
?
Jul 21, 2022 20:06
|
|
|
Thank you goons. We've booked today to re-home three more ex-batts in the middle of August, though if Molly and Nova need company sooner, we'll try a find a single hen needing a new home (like we did with Willow). It's been particularly hard on Molly today as we lost Willow on the 7th of June and Bella was Molly's only true friend (Mols doesn't make friends easily).
|
|
#
?
Jul 21, 2022 20:09
|
|
|
spookygonk posted:Thank you goons. I’m sorry that you lost Bella. You are such a light for ex-battery hens, it’s wonderful to see.
|
|
#
?
Jul 22, 2022 01:35
|
|
|
Sigh we just lost Ivy our glorious Blue Ameruacana and I have no idea howto stop more from being lost without just shutting them in the run at this point given how they're little devilish escape artists who will find a way out no matter what. Rest in piece Ivy you were a very fabulous bird who was also very broody.  
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2022 04:40
|
|
|
Roost in Peace, Ivy, you little floofbundle. 
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2022 12:10
|
|
|
I'm so sorry what a gorgeous and gentle little cloud puff, roost in peace Ivy
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2022 12:24
|
|
|
We found her body next to the garden, I don't know how we didn't see her before but it's there. I don't know what happened because we thought it was something big enough to just carry her off
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2022 17:47
|
|
|
Oh no, I'm so sorry for you and her.
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2022 18:14
|
|
|
I'm sorry. Finding them like that sucks.
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2022 18:51
|
|
|
I’m sorry, that really sucks. Have you examined the body for clues to what sort of predator your might be dealing with?
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2022 19:18
|
|
|
Yellowjackets were swarming it so there was nothing really to look at even after removing, I don't think it was a hawk because it wouldn't just flown off, same for something like a bobcat so I'm not sure what could've done it.
|
|
#
?
Jul 24, 2022 00:25
|
|
|
.
City of Glompton fucked around with this message at 03:23 on Oct 9, 2022 |
|
#
?
Jul 24, 2022 06:49
|
|
|
It was probably a dog, it’s always loving dogs. Or a canid of some sort anyway. Photo Dump:  Ivy and Claudia Duck only hatched out 1 duckling but it is the most loved baby I’ve ever seen.   Macy Duck has been sitting for a week. For a minute it looked like Popcorn Chicken wanted to share but she changed her mind.  I attempted to get Macy Duck some Tractor Supply ducklings but that was a fail. She wasn’t violent but she clearly wouldn’t accept them. Now I am raising the ducklings myself I put eggs in the incubator for Macy. Blanche & Co were the first to the chitlins bowl yesterday. She still has 9, after losing one on Day 2. Marge’s 6 and Audrey II’s 5 are doing great too. Buff Orpington Merryweather is hatching her 5 eggs today. She decided to sit in the goat barn which is super dangerous because goats are overactive idiots. I’ll be moving her and the hatchlings to the coop today. It’s so funny that they will tolerate being moved as soon as they have cheeping babies but absolutely not before that. One of the guineas is broody and she made her nest right next to a south facing brick wall so it’s getting super hot in the afternoon. I moved her eggs about 3 feet the other day but NOPE, she managed to move them right back where she had them. The other guineas are laying eggs somewhere else so broody is only on wooden eggs right now. It’s hot enough I may try to break up her nest to break her broodiness. Silly bird.
|
|
#
?
Jul 24, 2022 12:20
|
|
|
We lost two of our girls overnight to the heat, the first we've ever lost since they were chicks. Found one dead in the coop and the other burrowed into one of the sandy holes they've dug for themselves. I'm gutted. They were all alive and kicking just before sundown last night when I checked on them and made sure they had plenty of water. Our air conditioner went out yesterday and won't get fixed till tomorrow so I really don't know what else I could do. They had water to drink and stand in, shade, dust to bathe in, and we even put ice blocks in their water. Couldn't have even put diapers on them and brought them in since it was actually hotter in our house last night than it was outside.
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2022 14:04
|
|
|
How hot did it get? I've been using a swamp cooler and giving them fresh water every day and they've survived up to 106 during the day (in the shade it's not that bad, of course) and it stays about 85-90 in the insulated coop at night. Everyone seems fine, I'm still getting eggs and since I installed the swamp cooler I haven't seen mouth breathing or holding their wings up. Sorry to hear about your chooks man, may they roost in peace.
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2022 14:10
|
|
|
105-106. And yeah, it actually got up to 110 last week and they were ok so I thought they would be fine, but that day last week was a one-off and then it was back in the 90s. This week it's been 105 every day with no respite. The funny thing is that I'd considered getting a swamp cooler for them last week, but if I had it still wouldn't have done them any good, because with our AC out too if I'd had a swamp cooler last night I'd have swapped it inside for the humans.
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2022 14:16
|
|
|
I'm sorry about the devastating loss. It sounds like there really wasn't much you could do...such brutal heat for so long must have been really wearing on the poor girls. Do you have plans to change anything for the remaining flock, or do they seem to be holding up better?
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2022 14:31
|
|
|
my cat is norris posted:I'm sorry about the devastating loss. It sounds like there really wasn't much you could do...such brutal heat for so long must have been really wearing on the poor girls. The only thing I can think to do differently with our current setup is to be even more diligent about putting ice blocks in their coop and water during the hottest parts of the day. Maybe at least with 1/3 fewer chickens in there the coop won't get so hot at night. I feel so sorry for them, and my wife was just gutted.
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2022 14:47
|
|
|
Imagined posted:The only thing I can think to do differently with our current setup is to be even more diligent about putting ice blocks in their coop and water during the hottest parts of the day. Maybe at least with 1/3 fewer chickens in there the coop won't get so hot at night. I feel so sorry for them, and my wife was just gutted. I’m so sorry about your chickens. Ice blocks should help but that extreme heat is just brutal no matter what. My lovely Fauna, has been making a honking noise during the heat of the day for 3 days now. It started a day after we got 3” of rain and the heat index has been in the 100+ range for a week now, so I’d guess it’s some bacterial lung thing. Sometimes it goes away for a while and then returns at roost time. The times I’ve dealt with this before I’ve tried antibiotics (LA 200) and it worked for a week, then the illness came back, treated again and it reduced but didn’t get better. During treatment I have to toss all the brown eggs, so that means fewer eggs to the soup kitchen… I really hate making culling decisions but I think I have to It’s the summer of Never Have a Favorite Chicken.
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2022 21:12
|
|
|
Its a bit of a downer summer yeah. One of ours went a couple days ago. Was fine when eggs were getting collected, still in a heap when it was time for roosting. Nobody seems to have anything, and i couldnt see or find anything obvious wrong on or in her, so  Buried her out underneath one of the plum trees afterwards.
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2022 21:26
|
|
|
I'm real sorry to hear about your girls and hope this heat starts to abate soon. It's not in the hundreds but the high 90s can't be good.
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2022 23:47
|
|
|
thank you all for doing the right thing for your birds <3
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2022 23:56
|
|
|
  
|
|
#
?
Jul 29, 2022 17:42
|
|
|
SOON
|
|
#
?
Jul 29, 2022 23:27
|
|
|
Something interesting I'm either noticing or imagining since we lost 2 of our 6 overnight Monday: the other 4 seem... happier. We call our girls just by their tag colors. The two we lost were miss Purple and miss Yellow. In going back through photos, I found a seemingly inordinate number of pictures of those two, because they were the two boldest ones who would come straight up to me when I was doing anything outside. If you'd asked me, I'd have also said they were the healthiest and least likely to die from something like this. But since they've been gone, it seems to me like the other 4 already look healthier and some of them that had rough patches on their tailfeathers are already looking like they're filling back in. Is it possible Yellow and Purple just happened to be the chicken jerks? Or is just that there's 33% more food and space, and 33% less henpecking? EDIT: Roost in Peace     
Imagined fucked around with this message at 00:39 on Jul 30, 2022 |
|
#
?
Jul 30, 2022 00:17
|
|
|
Sorry for your loss. Our Molly has always been a moody, pecky hen (not really surprising as she's an ex-batt and lives with a huge hernia). Whenever she would go to the vet the other hens would just chill out together, share some food, dustbathe together. It's like, they knew they weren't going to get pecked for just being "in the way" somehow. We've lost two hens in five weeks. Willow was over nine years old, a good age for a Buff Sussex. Bella was just over five years old (nearly four years with us) and her sudden decline and passing was unexpected. spookygonk fucked around with this message at 08:10 on Jul 30, 2022 |
|
#
?
Jul 30, 2022 08:00
|
|
|
Quote is not edit
|
|
#
?
Jul 30, 2022 08:09
|
|
|
all the quails are gone and my pet sitter broke the news to me by asking "how many quails should there be" and "is the corner of the coop supposed to be collapsed inward"
|
|
#
?
Jul 30, 2022 17:02
|
|
|
OH my, oh no, I am so sorry! We very easily could lost our Petal and Cheddar last night as my partner forgot to close the lid to our compost area (which has direct access to the coop entrance) before sundown, and I didn't notice until this morning. We must be the only owners with good luck right now, as no foxes or feisty neighbourhood top cats visited. Our two girls are so meek and house-proud they didn't even bother escaping to dig over the garden. They're getting lots of treats today and they don't really know why! Your poor babies. 
|
|
#
?
Jul 30, 2022 18:15
|
|
|
Very rough times for the chicken thread lately and I'm so sorry for all your losses 
|
|
#
?
Jul 30, 2022 18:37
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 2, 2024 19:24 |
|
|
my cat is norris posted:all the quails are gone and my pet sitter broke the news to me by asking "how many quails should there be" and "is the corner of the coop supposed to be collapsed inward" Enfys posted:Very rough times for the chicken thread lately and I'm so sorry for all your losses
|
|
#
?
Jul 31, 2022 00:06
|
|
