Keeping hens and ducks chat.

edwink

edwink said:

Hi everyone

This is definitely NOT good news.......

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-62413041

For goodness sake eh?  I'm pretty close to Bedfordshire but not in the ZONE, thankfully.  Unless it spreads of course then mine will be back in chicken lockdown 😢😢😢😢😢😢

Edwink x

I've quoted this ^^^^ to put it at the top of a new page. Hopefully, more hen keepers will see it here. Nothing has been added to the GOV.UK website yet.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-62413041

Edwink x

edwink

Hi everyone

All quiet here and the little poorly hen is much much better, bless her.  We did have a little hic-up with her in the week so gave her a little apple cider vinegar and she is fine again now. I just hope that this sour crop doesn't keep happening to her now. I'm just keeping a close eye on her and I will see how she goes. Maybe she just had a little of the Sour stuff left in her crop after the first lot of apple cider vinegar we gave her, who knows? I'd rather try and deal with the issue myself than take her to the vets because they will sedate her, cut her crop open, flush it out and sew her back up again.  I think it will be a lot for a rescue hen at 4,5 years old. I'll just have to see how she goes, I guess. I'll ring the vet for advice if it keeps happening. 

Haven't heard any more regarding the Avian Flu in Bedfordshire as per my last post.  Just hoping and praying it doesn't spread down to Hertfordshire or my girls will be back in chicken lockdown 😢😢😢 Fingers and toes firmly crossed here.

Hope everyone and their feathered friends are ok.

Edwink x

Cheery_Daff

Glad to hear your little hen is doing ok edwink 😊

We are watching Bonny closely at the minute, she's going up and down. I haven't seen any evidence of a lash egg or soft eggs since she had her implant a couple of weeks ago thank goodness, and she's mostly keeping up with the others and eating etc. She had a couple of days of looking rather off colour and sorry for herself, but, touch wood, seems to be doing ok again now. 

thriftwizard

😟😤😡 - mites...

My fault, for sure, but I've lost two birds this week to mites. Unforgivably, having cleaned & disinfected the coop & dusted the birds during the last hot spell, I thought we were in the clear & didn't realise that the first casualty, a bird that had never "done well", had basically been eaten alive. Then I thought the second one was just inside laying when she didn't appear for breakfast the next day; should have checked. She was gasping her last the next morning and the coop was crawling. Horrified... and very sad. We've been keeping poultry here for 19 years and never had anything this bad.

Baffled that our vets won't prescribe ivermectin, "because we don't keep it here; try a farm vet or the farm shop." The farm shop just has herbal remedies, which really aren't much good against a real infestation. I've ordered some online, for "large fancy birds" i.e. parrots, but haven't yet received a dispatch email, which makes me think they're scratching around for it; is it all being snapped up by people stockpiling it against Covid?

edwink

thriftwizard said: 😟😤😡 - mites...

My fault, for sure, but I've lost two birds this week to mites. Unforgivably, having cleaned & disinfected the coop & dusted the birds during the last hot spell, I thought we were in the clear & didn't realise that the first casualty, a bird that had never "done well", had basically been eaten alive. Then I thought the second one was just inside laying when she didn't appear for breakfast the next day; should have checked. She was gasping her last the next morning and the coop was crawling. Horrified... and very sad. We've been keeping poultry here for 19 years and never had anything this bad.

Baffled that our vets won't prescribe ivermectin, "because we don't keep it here; try a farm vet or the farm shop." The farm shop just has herbal remedies, which really aren't much good against a real infestation. I've ordered some online, for "large fancy birds" i.e. parrots, but haven't yet received a dispatch email, which makes me think they're scratching around for it; is it all being snapped up by people stockpiling it against Covid?

Oh no, not ruddy mites. Poor you trying to sort that out 😮 and your poor little hens, bless them. It is not easy as I know from experience when we had Red Mite here they were even crawling on us, seriously they were. It was awful!! I keep Ivermectin here just in case, once bitten twice shy so to speak, although saying that I must check the expiry date of the bottle I have. I do hope your Ivermectin arrives soon. Maybe poultry keepers have stockpiled it because of Covid. Don't blame yourself it can happen to any of us poultry keepers that quickly too. We were a little slow noticing it here and their hut was crawling with the blooming things and on the girls. As you say you cleaned and disinfected the coop and dusted your girls during the hot spells. I am sure some poultry keepers wouldn't have done all of that to look after their hens. I think you have been incredibly unlucky, to be honest.

I wish I could offer more help but you obviously know about Ivermectin without me suggesting it.  Please do come back and let us know how you are getting on.  Fingers crossed the Ivermectin arrives pretty sharpish.

Take care

Edwink x

Cheery_Daff

Oh ThriftWizard, I'm sorry I missed your post, how very sad. Always distressing to lose a hen, and even more so when you feel like you could have done something differently yourself ☹

I confess I don't have any Ivermectin in our store cupboard - do you advise it? Touch wood, we've never had mites. We have a wooden coop so no idea how we've got away with it (although I am VERY liberal with the diatomaceous earth every time the bedding is changed so hopefully that helps). Hope we can continue to avoid, they sound awful ☹

Hope your drugs turn up soon x

thriftwizard

Thanks, all; no further casualties, I'm delighted to report, now the weather has cooled down a bit, the coop's been disinfected again & the birds bathed & dusted with diatomaceous earth. But having ordered Ivermectin online, enough for 50 "large fancy birds" - anything but chickens! and we have just 8 large fowl & 4 bantams - I'm still waiting for it & haven't even had the "dispatch" email although the site said "delivery by 22nd"... 

Cheery_Daff

Any news yet Thriftwizard? 

We're back to the vets with Bonny this afternoon 😕 She had her implant four weeks ago, and while she hasn't laid any more lash eggs, she's stillnot right and now seems to be getting worse. We'd decided we weren't going to rush back to the vets with her, because she finds it so distressing when you catch her, but she's clearly going downhill and I don't want to leave her if there's something we can do. 

She's still eating and pottering about, but one side seems very weak, and it's making me wonder if she's got some kind of tumour or something that's pressing on a nerve? Vet couldn't feel anything last time, but we've had them develop quickly before. 

She did seem to have an egg brewing last time, and they weren't sure whether to implant, as there's no guidance because they're not licenced for use in chickens,. We decided to, because it usually takes a few days to kick in, but it may well be that it's stopped her removing it, in which case I will feel truly awful ☹

Anyway, glad we could get her in today, and with one of our two preferred vets, the same one she saw last time.

I think we're going to have to prepare for possibly letting her go today though😕

sammyjammy

Cheery_Daff said:

Any news yet Thriftwizard? 

We're back to the vets with Bonny this afternoon 😕 She had her implant four weeks ago, and while she hasn't laid any more lash eggs, she's stillnot right and now seems to be getting worse. We'd decided we weren't going to rush back to the vets with her, because she finds it so distressing when you catch her, but she's clearly going downhill and I don't want to leave her if there's something we can do. 

She's still eating and pottering about, but one side seems very weak, and it's making me wonder if she's got some kind of tumour or something that's pressing on a nerve? Vet couldn't feel anything last time, but we've had them develop quickly before. 

She did seem to have an egg brewing last time, and they weren't sure whether to implant, as there's no guidance because they're not licenced for use in chickens,. We decided to, because it usually takes a few days to kick in, but it may well be that it's stopped her removing it, in which case I will feel truly awful ☹

Anyway, glad we could get her in today, and with one of our two preferred vets, the same one she saw last time.

I think we're going to have to prepare for possibly letting her go today though😕

You've already done the right thing by her and I have no doubt you will do whats right today, hopefully the vet can advise.  You can only do what you think is best at the time based on what you know so don't feel bad about what ifs, fingers crossed for you all at the vets x

Cheery_Daff

Thanks Sammy. I think Mr Cheery is going to argue for continued intervention despite what we've already talked about, so it might be a difficult afternoon for many reasons 🙄 it's hard to make a theoretical decision, but I do want to be prepared...