Pipd's Peeps!

[Crazy Maizie]

What do you treat your birds with?

Cockerels are definitely hard to find homes for. I thought yours would find homes quicker since they are more unique. I see people with silkies pair up all the time and even they have a hard time finding homes for pairs (I know that is not what you have). If I didn't have a cockerel, I'd for sure look at pairs. But, Cheddar is such a good rooster. He doesn't want me to pick him up, but settles quickly. What makes him nice is that he keeps an eye on the girls and keeps the other boys off as much as he can. I think it must wear him out though.

There is a swap in Shipshewana this Saturday. Not sure if you're interested. I might send my one cockerel with someone that I know that is going if its not raining.
I don't know how to feel about swap meets though.

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Elector PSP. Expensive, but it has a decently long shelf life, and the first time I tried it it worked in a matter of days and I didn't see mites on my birds again for like 2 and a half years. I feel like it would have worked this time as well if not for the unfortunate circumstances with Callette. I will take a look at some booties in a couple nights and see what things are looking like then, but hopefully we'll be bug-free soon.

I feel like I probably am not advertising them well, or in the right places. I just am nervous about posting them in more places for some reason, but I feel like they'd go a bit faster somewhere like Facebook where there seem to be more fancy chicken admirers. The impression I get from the people I've interacted with on Craigslist is that most of them are not interested in fancy chickens and just want your standard egg layers or meat birds for cheap, maybe occasionally a bantam but they seem to expect the same price as what you'd see bantams sold for in TSC. I believe I've priced them fairly, even a bit low considering how unusual and uncommon they are, and I won't even be recovering what I've put into them even if I do manage to sell every one of them at that price, but the CL buyers do not seem to agree with me on my price point. No one has even tried to haggle me, they just ghost me as soon as I state my price.

Cochin boys are great. Good to hear that Cheddar is doing so well in your flock! I definitely understand not wanting any more boys when you've already got such a good guy for your flock!

Swap meets kind of give me the heeby-jeebies, to be honest, but it would be less the people buying birds there and more the other people selling. My mom and I used to go to Wolf's swap meet every now and then when I was a kid, and there were always so many sick-looking birds and birds crammed into cages or in very unsanitary conditions... I'd worry anything I didn't sell would be bringing disease back to my flock when I brought them back home. It looks like Shipshewana's swaps go through October, though, so if I'm still struggling to place birds in a month or two I can always give it a shot.

 

[Crazy Maizie]

I didn't have the guy take my bantam cockerel - so he's still here. I had the same worry about what to do with him if he didn't sell and came back to my flock.

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Amaretto, one of the Silkie mixes that hatched chicks, started laying again about two weeks ago, and since then she's been less and less interested in taking care of her brood, even running off to free-range a few times within the past week or so and ignoring their cries looking for her. Well, they're old enough they should be fine, about 6 weeks old now, and they seemed to be doing okay in the flock despite this, so I wasn't too worried about it. A couple days ago I noticed my old Red Dorking hen, Perdita, chirping for them, though they ignored her and kept their distance like they do with all of the adults. Perdita goes broody occasionally, but she has a deformed leg that she can't put any weight on or bend, so she can't exactly incubate eggs or brood tiny, newly-hatched chicks because she's likely to crush them. Because of that, I've never let her hatch or raise chicks.

I went out just now to let the birds out for their afternoon free-range, and as the flock hurried off to forage, I heard Perdi chirping again. I looked her way just in time to see Amaretto's three babies rushing to her and her feeding them whatever morsel it was that she'd found. My heart! This is exactly why the Dorkings still remain my absolute favorite breed--they are simply the sweetest and most gentle birds I've ever known!

Perdita and her new brood:

 

[Crazy Maizie]

That is the sweetest.

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

It is I hate to follow that up with what I'm about to post, but it's a hazard of having so many older birds.

Bryony, one of my Mottled Cochin bantams, passed on in the night. I'd noticed she was slowing down for a bit, and that yesterday she was not coming out of the coop at all. She wasn't the oldest, 6 years, but outside of her age nothing else seemed wrong. Nothing respiratory, no swelling or discoloration of the skin, no injuries, etc. Sometimes, all I can guess is that it's just their time. Bry was probably the most low-key of the Mottleds, temperament-wise, though I favored her a bit for her lovely, round shape and quietly inquisitive nature.

I strongly suspect that old She Who, the one that I frequently find stuck on her back, is also not long for this world, as she's started exhibiting signs of heart failure. At 11 years of age, I suppose I can't be too surprised that her time here is winding down.


In more positive news, though, I'm pretty confident that the mite infestation has been resolved. No signs of mites since a few days after the last treatment I posted about. I did go ahead and give them all one more round of it this week just to be safe, as I had a small bug of some sort on my hand after handling one of the cockerels. I don't think it was a mite, but it just seemed wiser to treat one last time just to be safe.

 

[Crazy Maizie]

I think Lemon is going broody.
Last night she was in the nest box which concerned me because she is always roosting when i come to check. But, she let me pull eggs out from under her. However, when the other chickens started to go in to roost, she screamed at them! Then, I went to check to make sure she was OK and she screamed again because one of the barred rocks was poking its head in the nesting box.
This morning she came out with the rest if them. I've never had a broody. Is this how it begins?

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Uh-oh! That does sound a lot like broody behavior!

The starting point varies a lot from bird to bird in my experience. Some of my birds are absolutely normal one day and the next day, BAM, they're smushed down on a nest. Some of my birds start to linger a bit longer in the nest every time they lay an egg until finally they decide to start brooding. Some start doing the broody cluck-cluck-cluck while acting normal otherwise, and then I find them sitting in a nest at night a few days later. Some do just what your girl is doing, seemingly normal most of the day but wanting to sit instead of perch at night and scream at everyone who even glances their direction, until eventually they're doing that all day long instead of just in the evening.

Cochins can be particularly stubborn about breaking, too. If you don't want her to hatch or raise chicks, I'd set up a cage or fence off a corner of the pen with food and water so that she's out and away from the nests and can't get to them. The more activity from the other birds around her the better, so keep that in mind when picking out a location. I prefer to wait until mine are for sure staying on the nest all day because sometimes they are still laying when they start acting grumpy and I'd rather they lay their eggs in the nests. Once I've started finding them in the nest first thing in the morning and determined to stay on it all day long, even if I remove them, that's when I move mine to broody jail. Then either they stay there 24/7, or I let them roost with the other birds at night and put them back in jail first thing in the morning. How long their jail time lasts depends entirely on how interested in the nests they are when I let them out on parole.

Or, the other option is to get her some eggs or chicks to rear... but of course if you don't have the room for more birds or don't want to deal with the cockerels from hatching, that plan is less than ideal.

 

[Crazy Maizie]

The next day she wasn't on at all, but last night back at it. So sounds like option 3.
I definitely don't want more cockerels, but also want a few bantam girls, but this probably isn't the best option for that. I've tried that experiment before (with broody ducks). However, it's so fun watching them hatch.

 

[Crazy Maizie]

She was still in there this morning and when I took her out, she just laid flat on the ground. Poor thing.