Keeping hens and ducks chat.

edwink

Pyxis said:

Hello, Edwink, I was wondering where you had got to!

How are you coping with all this?

All good here thanks Pyxis.  I hope everything is good with you too.  We've had a few wobbly days between us and really missing friends but just trying to get on with all and sundry keeps us busy and focussed.  There is always something to do hen wise and also veg/fruit growing wise this time of year. So far we have 54 tomato plants growing, 11 outdoor cucumber plants, 7 courgette plants, sweetpeas, and numerous varieties of lettuce and rocket. Also, 4 sunflower plants growing nicely in their little pots.  We have a competition every year to see who can grow the tallest one.  Everything has been grown from seed so that has kept me busy.  Still not got raised veg beds done but have finished 2 @ 12ft in length and 1 @ 6ft in length, just got 3 more of the 6ft length ones to do. All of them are made out of wood that has been dropped off here to chop up for our stoves but we have been sifting through the piles and dragging all the good wood out or wood that has plenty of life left in it and have been storing it ready for this job.  We should have it all done within the next couple of weeks, hopefully.

We've not had use of our wood burning cooker stove since before Christmas and was just in the process of having a Biomass stove delivered and installed but then lockdown happened and everything came to a standstill. Our old stove had various issues and for our safety, we stopped using it and had it removed.  We have managed with a 2 ring portable electric hob and a flat grill type sarnie toaster.  We had a lot of homemade suppers in the freezer so been using those up plus had lots of things with salad.  We have really missed our homemade pies with a crunchy jacket potato and veg.  Hopefully, it won't be too much longer and we can then arrange to have everything fitted, probably in time for next Autumn/winter I guess.  

Right better get some sleep and stop waffling or I will be up late in the morning.

Edwink x

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edwink

Hi hope all is well with everyone

All ok here except that we have a quiet hen, bless her.  Noticed her standing around on Tuesday so have kept a close eye on her since. She is eating but we have noticed that she is just eating a little and then stopping but at least she is eating something.  We have offered her some mashed sweetcorn and mealworms and she has eaten a little of that too besides the few pellets she has eaten morning and evening.  Today her comb has started to look a bit purple so it appears at the moment that it could be her heart. 

Sadly with ex-battery hens, they have had a very poor start in life living in those awful ghastly cages.  They haven't been able to walk about and get any exercise at all so some won't have very strong hearts and this shows after a while once rehomed.  She has been with me for just over 7 months now, bless her.  I'll just make sure she isn't being picked on for being slow and if I see any bullying against her I'll let her stay around Hoppy on the grass by the house. She will still be able to see the others through a netted fence so she will know the others are still around and she will have Hoppy to sit with.

I'll keep you all updated.

Edwink x 

Pyxis

Aw, bless her little cotton socks. 

Why does a heart problem make the combs go purple? Is it due to reduced oxygenated blood flow to the comb? Like the way our lips would go blue?

I’ll never forget a girl in my class at school, as a teenager, who had a hole in the heart, and her lips always had a bluish tinge. Looking back, I’m now wondering why she hadn’t been operated on, but maybe in those days heart surgery on children wasn’t as advanced at so they had to wait until they were grown? I think she did have the op at some stage when we were at school, just not initially.

Sorry, digressing. As I always do. Attention span of a gnat.
Blame the ADD!

Cheery_Daff

Aw, bless the little lass edwink xx So glad she's got you to look after her. 

Yes, it's to do with oxygen Pyxis - this is what happened to our Mildred, her comb gradually (and then more quickly) went more and more purple and then shrivelled. Comb colour is a good sign of health in chickens (although I think they do change in relation to heat etc a little bit too). Hope she perks up edwink, it's horrid to see them so quiet. 

All fine here, getting used to the new order. Beaky is now top hen (or Monster Beaky, as we've taken to calling her - she's now enormous compared to the others, and is turning into a bit of a tyrant on occasion). Bessie is next, although she's looking a little worse for wear feather-wise at the minute, and we had to put blue spray on both her and Rusty's heads at the start of Beaky's new reign... Things seem to have settled down now, but Bessie never really regained her fluffy pantaloons after moulting so she looks a little ragged. I might try to get some blue spray on her undercarriage too as I suspect Beaky might be taking a sneaky peck, but we'll see. Rusty is cheeky and noisy as usual. Both Beaky and Bessie are showing their dominance by pecking her and shoving her out of the food bowl (even when there are three bowls they go over to whichever she's at and shove her out the way) but she is undeterred, and of course we always end up giving her more treats and bringing her into the house occasionally to eat out of the way of the others. 

It's not a constant bullying, don't get me wrong! They rub along quite happily together most of the time, but obviously they've lost their original top two hens in a short space of time so there's going to be a bit of shuffling and messing about I think. Overall they seem happy enough (let's see how happy they are when we can eventually fetch them some new hens!)

Pyxis

Blue spray?

edwink

Yes, Cheery is right it is to do with the hen's Oxygen that causes their combs to gradually turn purple.  I strongly believe now that this is happening to my poor little hen.  She is still out with the others but mainly keeping herself to herself and nods off from time to time.  She eats when we get them all out in the mornings so at least she is eating something. It is easy to separate her from all the others if I go walkabouts because all the hens follow me thinking I have some nice treats in one of my dungaree pockets, they are not silly that's for sure.  When they all follow me I can get them into a different area than where our poorly hen is and Mr Edwink sits with her while she has a treat dish of food like sweetcorn mashed with dried mealworms and egg mixed with a little water. At least when she eats some of that yummy (for hens) mixture she is taking in some fluids as well. So far this is working as she is getting a little more food than she would do in her situation otherwise. 

The purple-ish blue spray is normally used as an anti-peck medication to stop hens pecking at each other if they have a slightly bald or very bald area of skin.  This can happen when they moult or if any of the hens are being picked on by others. Firstly by all accounts, it tastes ghastly to the hen that is doing the pecking, and secondly, it helps with the healing process of the skin.  It actually dyes the skin so stays there even if it rains and they get wet so you don't need to respray the area unless it is necessary once the colouring has finally faded.  I think that makes sense!

Forgot what else I was going to say now after all my waffling.  I'll pop back on in a while.

Edwink x

edwink

Our little hen took herself off to bed tonight, she was a bit slow going up the little ladder but didn't struggle at all so we were pleased that she made the effort to sleep on the perches with the others.  We will just keep a close eye on here again tomorrow and see how she is then.  I'll update again tomorrow. 

Cheery, did I read that correctly?  The bit in your post that says "let's see how happy they are when we can eventually fetch them some new hens".  Are you planning to rehome some more?. 

Sounds like yours have established a new pecking order which is good. Hens can be such meanies sometimes especially with 2 hens pushing one around a little. When I had 3 here I had the same with 2 being best pals and the odd hen they accepted very well but pushed her away from food once in a while. They never hurt her or anything it was dominance more than bullying I would say.  I love the name Monster Beaky, by the way, was it you or Mr Cheery who thought of that name?. 

Edwink x

Cheery_Daff

Tis Mr Cheery who's taken to calling her Monster Beaky 😂 She has deserved it some days! She was always the one of the new ladies who was most up for a fight though 🙄

Yes, I think we will be rehoming some more as soon as BHWT ooen again. Three just doesn't seem like very many somehow... won't get more than 2 or 3 though, we get so close to them I wouldn't want to lose that with a bigger flock (and can you imagine having any more than that running around in the house?! 😮😮😂 ) BHWT aren't open though right now (although I did see another rehoming place is open again, but I don't think round here). We'll see.

Cheery_Daff

And fingers crossed for your little lass edwink. Glad she's taken herself off to bed. Will scatter a few extra treats in her honour here tomorrow x

in_my_wellies

Good evening. It's so hard when they get ill isn't it? My poorly one revived for a few weeks but died yesterday evening. She tried so hard. She even produced an egg in the morning - a normal one but with a dark brown 'belt' all the way round the middle. 
So now I have only two very bright and lively hens who I don't think lay any eggs. I've only been getting one most days since Christmas, all similar, and I presume from the hen which died. No chance off getting more just now. Fortunately my daughter's have upped their production this month
I wish mine wouldn't sleep and poo in the nest box. It's a roll away so I propped it up at a steep angle to make it uncomfortable but instead of one hen long ways they now sleep two sideways - the one must slide into the other and squash her but they still do it. But then these are the two that don't lay so they don't understand....
I let them free range in the winter but can't in the summer. Too many plants which might be poisonous. I let them out on the lawn in a 4' square guinea pig run, moving it twice a day rotating round the lawn. They really do enjoy it, rolling round in the grass. I used to put a dust tray in there but they didn't use it much preferring the grass.