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Well the hens that are still roaming free outside have started to sneak into our backyard and eat our chickens' food... and also Roostroyer has already mated with them  . My coop is small and if we end up catching them, I don't know if they'll fit in the coop to sleep at night. I guess I'll find out eventually.
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Sep 29, 2011 16:54
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Chido posted:Well the hens that are still roaming free outside have started to sneak into our backyard and eat our chickens' food... and also Roostroyer has already mated with them Haha! Roostroyer is a hen magnet!  I'm sure Roo doesn't care if his coop is crowded. More hens for him! 
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Sep 29, 2011 18:32
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Nettle Soup posted:
So sorry to hear about your rooster. You gave him love and a good home, and it seems that he especially appreciated it near the end.
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Sep 29, 2011 19:00
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Chido posted:Well the hens that are still roaming free outside have started to sneak into our backyard and eat our chickens' food... and also Roostroyer has already mated with them
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Sep 30, 2011 02:23
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... My brother-in-law saw a really cute chick at the feed store. She is all white, completely feathered, less than a pound in weight, so she is probably 7-9 weeks old. He bought her and the pullet turns out to be a leghorn. I thought I had a bad case of chicken fever, he's worse. And in other news, Spaghetti's wound was pretty much sealed, just a tiny scab and the skin looked kinda thin, but the wound was closed. Well, it seems it was too soon to let Roostroyer have access to her because the wound reopened. I have to keep her separated again for a couple of weeks again  , and I'm gonna make her wear an apron until all her feathers have come out and her skin is 100% well.
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Sep 30, 2011 02:45
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K, I need some help with one of my chickens, I've already posted in bakyardchickens.com but nobody has replied yet. I hope you guys can help me. I left for work today at around 2:30 and my pullet Godzilla was fine. I called home at 6 to remind my niece to lock up the chickens when I'm told Godzilla got a very swollen face and he eyes are a bit watery/bubbly. I can't do much until I get home so I tried to calm my nieces down as they were crying .I get home at around 8 pm and take a look at Godzilla. she's lock up in my bathroom right now, and the poor thing looks like a chipmunk. Her face feels very warm and her cheeks right under her eyes are very swollen. Her eyes are half closed because of that. Now, Godzilla hasn't been sneezing at all, she's been acting normal and eating and pooping well. No nasal or eye discharge, and even now she doesn't really have much discharge from her eyes, and her nose is clean. She probably got stung by something, is there any way to help her feel more comfortable and help with her swollen face?
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Oct 3, 2011 06:12
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Would baking soda/powder be okay on a chicken? I don't remember which one, but when I sat on a wasp yesterday ( ) my roommate slathered my leg with it to stop the itching from the stings, might help her too if the others don't just peck it off.
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Oct 3, 2011 06:21
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That's the thing, I don't see any sting on her face, . She doesn't seem to be itchy, but she looks miserable. I don't even know if I can give her aspirin or anything to help with the swell. All I can do right now is help her drink some water, and let her sleep in my bathroom, I don't know how else to help her
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Oct 3, 2011 06:25
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Chido posted:That's the thing, I don't see any sting on her face, You can try giving her a tiny bit of ibuprofen, 1/4 or less of a 200mg tablet wrapped in something nice, might reduce the swelling. My Rooster ate loads of it, (He looked like he was on his last legs so we figured it couldn't make it any worse) and there's a couple of studies and a few anecdotal posts on the internet if you look around. Asprin is fairly safe too, there's dosages here (Incidently, you can give dogs asprin but you CAN'T give them ibuprofen, they can't metabolise it, making it toxic) I think bee stings are acid and wasp stings are alkaline. So holding a compress with vinegar on the sting may help. (if you find it) Nettle Soup fucked around with this message at 08:13 on Oct 3, 2011 |
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Oct 3, 2011 07:57
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Nettle Soup posted:You can try giving her a tiny bit of ibuprofen, 1/4 or less of a 200mg tablet wrapped in something nice, might reduce the swelling. My Rooster ate loads of it, (He looked like he was on his last legs so we figured it couldn't make it any worse) and there's a couple of studies and a few anecdotal posts on the internet if you look around. Asprin is fairly safe too, there's dosages on BYC somewhere. Thank you  . My brother-in-law went to buy some aspirin since we didn't have any, and I just crushed one, dissolved whatever bit of powder stuck to my finger in a cup of cold water, and gave her some with a dropper. I hope she gets better tomorrow, these chickens are the first pets my nieces have ever had, and they both were so devastated when they saw Godzilla's face all puffed up .
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Oct 3, 2011 08:17
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If it's not a sting it could be a respiratory infection. CRD is common in chickens and is not curable. His nasal passages will swell and the bad news is he may never loose that puffy look. The fluid crystalizes in chickens for some reason. Hopefully it is a sting of some sort and he'll get better.
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Oct 3, 2011 13:46
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Well she hasn't had any symptoms of a respiratory infection, and according to my nieces Godzilla's face went from normal to swollen within a couple of hours yesterday. Today one side of her face is a bit less swollen and her eye more open, and she is hungry as she just devoured some mealworms I gave her, so I think it was a sting or some kind of bug bite.
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Oct 3, 2011 16:50
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I'm a firm believer that you shouldn't look for pets, if you're supposed to have one, it'll find you. A woman knocked on the door earlier, "Hey, I live round the corner... I have 6 chicks and a mother for sale, you want em?" Mostly Orpingtons, which is what we wanted! Gotta find names for em now...
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Oct 3, 2011 22:04
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Will I have to put the birds in a bigger box when they get bigger? I'm using a really large plastic bin as a brooder for the chicks. http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/31zgRJEBGzL._SL500_AA300_.jpg But they're already trying to fly out of it and they're only 1.5 weeks old. Will the chicks need more surface area as they grow to 3-4 weeks? When can/should I clip their wings?
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Oct 3, 2011 22:33
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Maximusi posted:Will I have to put the birds in a bigger box when they get bigger? I'm using a really large plastic bin as a brooder for the chicks. You can make a lid with some welded wire, just make sure the holes are small so the chicks don't get stuck. Also get used to having mini escape artists, they'll keep trying to get out because they may feel lonely and want to be near you ... or they just want to explore.Edit: I think you only have 2 chicks, right? they probably feel lonely and that's why they keep trying to get out. When my first 3 pullets were babies, they would keep trying to get out of their box and peep their tiny hearts out whenever I locked them in their box. I eventually transfered them to a dog carrier, but I'd let them run around in my room so they'd keep quiet. this is what would usually happen after I'd let them out:  They'd settle for sleeping in a chicke pile on top of their crate whenever I was in my computer. That was the only way they'd keep quiet . They'd even take sunbaths in my room and stay mostly on top of the crate whenever I was is my room . They just felt lonely and wanted to be near "mommy" so they'd get more of a sense of being par of a flock, I think. Things got a bit annoying when they got bigger and still insisted on getting to roost on the back of my chair while i was raiding. I'm glad they were almost feathered and ready to go out.  This is how old they were and how fully feathered they were when I finally took them outside to sleep in their coop. the big chick is Roostroyer, same age as the other pullets, but he's just a big fluffy boy  they were probably 11-12 weeks old I think. Chido fucked around with this message at 23:02 on Oct 3, 2011 |
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Oct 3, 2011 22:46
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Wow. Wait a minute, don't you have to have the heat lamp on them at all times? I think my chicks are scared of me. They run away when I try to pet them. And when you let them out don't they poop everywhere? Cute chickens.
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Oct 3, 2011 23:02
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Maximusi posted:Wow. Wait a minute, don't you have to have the heat lamp on them at all times? I think my chicks are scared of me. They run away when I try to pet them. And when you let them out don't they poop everywhere? Cute chickens. I didn't have a heat lamp because the desk lamp I borrowed broke . When I got these chicks under my care, it wasn't a planned thing, my brother-in-law found them outside. There was a street flock roaming freely in March, and these chicks got separated at one point and he found them hiding in the bushes late one night, without their mom nearby. So the dog crate and everything I did I had to learn as it went.The whole mini saga is here: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3399768 Also as they start to grow feathers, they'll need to be less and less near the lamp, and since you leave in SoCal like I do, with the warm weather we have right now, I think your chicks won't need the heat lamp that much. When my lamp broke, I started to use a heater in my room, since March/April were rather cold this year, so that kinda took care of the temperature issue. Yes, they pooped everywhere on my carpet, but I didn't mind much. You can wash off chicken poop stains easily with dish soap and warm water, and the chickies needed space to run, as you can see here , the chickies were probably 4 weeks old in that video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rYB0XAKBuE Also my first 3 pullets would always run away from me whenever I tried to grab them, specially the smallest one (she still runs away), but if I was sitting, they'd jump on me and roost on my shoulders and head. Now, since you have a heat lamp, I'd say you can still leave it on in one side of the box, so the chicks can get away from it if they get too hot. Chido fucked around with this message at 23:13 on Oct 3, 2011 |
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Oct 3, 2011 23:10
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Hey Chido: Sorry to hear that Godzilla isn't feeling well. You might try sending a PM to Velvet Sparrow and point her to your request post in this thread. VS has been around online lately but I suspect that her 'net access is limited right now. She's been tweeting and posting on her LJ and has replied to me a few times in the past week so I think she would probably respond to your request for help. Inveigle fucked around with this message at 00:52 on Oct 4, 2011 |
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Oct 4, 2011 00:50
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Chido posted:K, I need some help with one of my chickens, I've already posted in bakyardchickens.com but nobody has replied yet. I hope you guys can help me. Try First State Vet Supply, it's run by Peter Brown, the "Chicken Doctor." He offers consults and you can buy just about any medication you need off his site. I frequently see him recommended on BYC.
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Oct 4, 2011 04:14
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Nettle Soup posted:A woman knocked on the door earlier, "Hey, I live round the corner... I have 6 chicks and a mother for sale, you want em?" Hi Nettle Soup! Be sure and post some photos of your new pet chicks and hen! We all love seeing photos of people's pet chickens! What will you name them? Do you need suggestions?
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Oct 4, 2011 04:26
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Thank you for the link ! Godzilla's face looks better today, she had no fever hat I noticed as her legs didn't feel nearly as warm as they were last night, her face isn't all bright red, and the swelling on the left side of her face went down more than in the other side, but both cheeks are less swollen than last night. She was also very hungry, but it seems that it bothers her to eat anything hard like her pellets, so I gave her mealworms, about 2 tablespoons of tuna, some bread, and let her outside for a bit so she could eat some grass. If she stops improving then I'll bother VS and probably ask that chicken doctor too for advice, but meanwhile things seem to be going ok.
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Oct 4, 2011 05:54
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Chido posted:Thank you for the link Huh! I wonder if she got stung by a bee or spider? Do you have bees in your yard? I'm glad Godzilla is better. I'm sure she's enjoying eating the yummy special "soft" foods rather than her boring old pellets. I bet she'd enjoy some soft-boiled or scrambled eggs and some hot dogs.
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Oct 4, 2011 07:18
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Inveigle posted:Hi Nettle Soup! Be sure and post some photos of your new pet chicks and hen! We all love seeing photos of people's pet chickens! Gonna take pics yep, was pretty much dark when they arrived, our three remaining hens had already gone to bed and everything. The current older hens are Henrietta, Abigail and Daisy, chicks have no names yet except for... My special little brother, bless him, came in a few months back and pronounced our rooster as "Mr. Hardpecker", because "He pecks hard!" and my mum is determined to name that to whatever one turns out to be a boy (because there'll be at least one...) Mr. Hardpecker, Cock at Large. I think the mother is a white leghorn, what do you guys want to name her? Edit: Uploaded some pics from my phone here, proper camera is downstairs still. Nettle Soup fucked around with this message at 17:47 on Oct 4, 2011 |
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Oct 4, 2011 07:30
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Nettle Soup posted:I think the mother is a white leghorn, what do you guys want to name her? Name the mom Pillow!
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Oct 6, 2011 00:49
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Well my efforts to isolate the ill hen didn't work, the virus made its rounds already and everybody got sick. Most of the chickens are almost back to normal, but Spaghetti the barred rock hen isn't doing too well. She breathes normal now, there's no nasal or eye discharge, and is molting, but she won't eat. I've seen her eat a bit of scratch and drink a lot of water, but she doesn't really eat. I managed to make her eat 2 meal worms, and a bit of bread, and also a spoonful of cottage cheese yesterday, and she ate a bit of scratch and a couple more mealworms today that I know of (I had to work in the morning, I don't know if she ate anything during that time). Spaghetti mostly just stands in one place, or walks around a little bit, I'm just glad she's still drinking water on her own, I just wish she'd eat more. Spaghetti has never been the healthiest chicken out there, she wasn't in a very good condition when we got her and her poop has never been solid. Her poop now is basically a yellowish water with tiny pieces of very green poop. I le her hang out with the other pullets outside, and just keep Roo and the alpha hen Dust separated from them so Spaghetti doesn't feel lonely, and she does seem to be more alert when she's with the flock. At this point I just can wait and see if her appetite comes back. the poor thing must've had horrible owners before us, I really hope she gets better, she deserves it.
Chido fucked around with this message at 07:25 on Oct 11, 2011 |
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Oct 11, 2011 07:14
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Usually watery poo w/ green means she's not absorbing food. Try some plain yogurt (with cultures) mixed with oatmeal and some crushed granite to grind it all up.
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Oct 11, 2011 14:12
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Chido: I'm so sorry that your chickens are sick again. Do you have any idea how they keep getting reinfected? Or are they just never getting fully 'well'? In my chicken news, its cooled down, and the hens are laying. The older girls are a bit less productive than they have been, but egg size seems to have increased. I'm now pretty sure that the five chicks my Barred Rock is raising are all Red Sex-links, as is one of the chicks that I didn't give to her. Right now, I still have several chicks that I'm trying to move on craigslist, which I suspect is going to take awhile, since they are too old to be cute, and too young to lay.
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Oct 12, 2011 07:34
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I don't know where they got the virus from. My rooster and the stray hen are fine, and everybody is ok now except Spaghetti. My guess is that they either got something from the birds that come to drink from their waterer and eat their food (and poop everywhere in the backyard), or maybe the stray hens we haven't been able to catch yet are carriers for something. These hens sleep on a tree next door, and every few days come to our backyard to eat with our chickens, and the sluts also come to mate with Roo (he's also a slut); however, I haven't seen any of Roo's street girlfriends sick. Before his illness affecting most of my hens, I only had problems with rusty a while ago, and with Spaghetti who has never been quite healthy, and that problem comes from before we got her at the feed store. In other news, I'm still hoping Spaghetti will make it. She doesn't eat much and is very underweight, she drinks a lot of water though. Her poop is pretty much yellowish water with some whitish/yellowish stuff and tiny bits of green poop. Finally today I got her to eat some mealworms, and after days of offering her different treats, she decided to eat about a spoonful of layer feed soaked in water so it was soft and mushy. I got her to eat another spoonful of that mash tonight, and her poop was still pretty much water, but it had also chunks of real poop in it. I'm gonna prepare more of that mash tomorrow using some unflavored Pedialyte and fill her waterer with Pedialyte too. I'm crossing my fingers I can get her to eat more mealworms tomorrow, or at least some bread besides her mash .
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Oct 12, 2011 08:09
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pPN7qy2080 Set up the camera in the garden and filmed them for half an hour, nothing major happens but it's a nice record of them. Do you think mother is getting bored of them yet? (I honestly don't expect anyone to watch that whole thing) Album of all the images I took is here: http://imgur.com/a/Ok74H Should I be cutting the mothers claws? They seem awfully long... She came with the chicks. So: Mother: Lydia (Leghorn) Biggest orange/white one: Lemon Tortie/Spotted one: Caroline (Named after our old cat) Tiniest Orange One: Sporticus (Named by my little brother, cause he has fluffy feet...?) Biggest orange one: No name yet, any suggestions? Two at the end who aren't in the video: Pekin: Tyrion (Hardpecker) Orange: Sparrow
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Oct 16, 2011 13:28
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Nettle Soup posted:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pPN7qy2080 Admittedly I didn't watch the whole thing but I did watch a few minutes here and there. They spend a lot of time digging in the dirt. Did you put down scratch or are they finding worms?
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Oct 16, 2011 15:16
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Zeta Taskforce posted:Admittedly I didn't watch the whole thing but I did watch a few minutes here and there. They spend a lot of time digging in the dirt. Did you put down scratch or are they finding worms? I threw down a handful of corn at the start, and about 16:50 I give them a worm and they have no idea what to do with it.  Most of the video they're on the concrete patio though.I dug a bag of corn and sunflower seeds (some sort of parrot mix that'd started growing...) and a handful of corn into the bed where they move at the end, and I'd just dug it over so they were probably finding worms too.
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Oct 16, 2011 16:00
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I've tried feeding my chickens lettuce and worms, but they don't seem to want it. They just peck at it and drop it.
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Oct 17, 2011 16:32
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My chickens have varied tastes. Each has their favorites and dislikes. None of them really like greens unless they eat it themselves out of the yard like clover. It took them a couple of times for them to see worms as food, but they always loved mealworms.
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Oct 17, 2011 17:44
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Where do you get mealworms?
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Oct 17, 2011 17:57
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I always got them from the pet store. Anywhere that would also sell crickets should have live mealworms.
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Oct 17, 2011 18:04
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How do I make my chickens love me? I have to grab them every evening to put them back in the coop because they don't know they're supposed to go in yet. Now they're afraid of me.
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Oct 20, 2011 02:23
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Maximusi posted:How do I make my chickens love me? Bribe them with food. I taught my chickens to come to me wen I whistle by whistling the same tune whenever I was going to give them treats. I also say "hey guys!" in a very high pitched voice when I have treats. Now they come to me whether I have food or not, and we made it a routine whenever I lock the for the night, which works perfect for the stray hen we have that is still very skittish and won' let us grab her. This is what I do: 2-3 times a day call all the chickens for treats. At around 6 pm, lock the big fat rooster outside the run, and then herd the stray hen into the coop, there's a crate there that I use to lock her in. I lock her before everybody else because she would climb on the trees to sleep and the other hens were learning to do the same. Now the hen will go to the crate on her own before everybody else .At 6:30, I go out again to check if everybody is in the coop. Sometimes my barred rock hen would try to sleep in the same spot with the other hens, but I move her to another perch, since the roo also sleeps in that spot, and a lot of drama would ensue if I let them all fight for the coveted corner. At 7pm, I grab the rooster and put him in the coop. By now everybody else is asleep. The trick is consistency. Chickens aren't as dumb as one would think, and they can learn from routines. 2 of my hens hate being chased but they love perching on my shoulders, so if I kneel, they'll jump on their own on my shoulders. Another hen does like the attention, and the barred rock just doesn't enjoy cuddling. Since I know now how to approach each bird, I can manage to handle them without much trouble.
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Oct 20, 2011 03:52
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Our chickens new thing is whenever they see movement upstairs in the kitchen(on the second story), they climb up our deck and sit on the railing in front of the kitchen window squawking at us until we give them a treat. As soon as they see the light come on in the morning, they start clucking and climbing up the deck. Useful for getting rid of scraps while cooking!
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Oct 20, 2011 14:04
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The dogs got out and killed one of the chicks.  I didn't even hear anything, all I knew was when they bought me him. Poor Sportacus... It was my own fault, I was doing something in the front garden, the dogs were out with me and I forgot that the back gate was open and they were out of their little run (They'd really out-grown it)I don't think the dog really wanted to KILL it, I think she just wanted to play with it, she's the one that sometimes I'll look out the window and see her shagging one the hens, and all the other chicks were unharmed. Still a stupid mistake though. I blocked up any chick-sized holes in the main run and put them in with the three older hens and the two older chicks, the mum went into the house, called the chicks in after her and they even went to bed in the right house without fuss once it got dark. One of the older hens, I guess she's the boss-hen, and the mother fight every now and again, but it's quickly over and I guess they'll settle in. That night I opened the lid on the nest boxes to check they were all in, and in one there was one chick and the two older chicks, and in the other was crammed the mother, two chicks and one light sussex, it was like a solid wall of chicken.
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Oct 21, 2011 06:06
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That really sucks. I'm worried about the neighbor's dog doing the same thing since the chicks have been escaping underneath the fence. Is there anything I shouldn't feed the chickens? Are any foods poisonous for them? I've just been throwing everything to them, from cheese, to corn, to pasta. They also really like lentils.
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Oct 28, 2011 20:15
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