Hensington Hospital

I've had a Light Sussex hen in the Hensington Hospital for a few days here. She is one of the 'guest hens' that is staying with us while her family are overseas for the Christmas Holidays and the poor thing has caught a cold. (Colds/respiratory infections) are fairly common amongst chicken flocks and this is nothing serious. However, because she has been a little bit off colour, she has also become the victim of some bullying from her coopmates. She wound up with an injury to her head near her comb which was quite inflamed and sore so I decided to separate her out from the flock and put her into sickbay.

Photo showing (black, crusty)  nasal discharge and the sore, red area next to her
comb where another hen has pecked her.

 

Closeup of peck injury near comb on the lefthand side of the hen's head.
Swollen, sore and hot to the touch.

I isolated her, and put some avian multi-vitamins in her drinking water and then cleaned the injury with diluted hydrogen peroxide in water. I also used a Q Tip to clean some of the gunk out of her nostrils and then applied Savlon cream to the injured place on her head.

Today, the hen seems a little brighter and she laid an egg this morning which is generally a good sign. Her appetite is still good and she seems to enjoy the taste of the water with vitamins added. I will clean her wound again this afternoon, and see how she goes over the next few days. She is still coughing, so not completely out of the woods, yet. I am confident she will make a full recovery though.

Photo taken this afternoon showing reduction of swelling around the peck
injury and cleaner nostrils.

Bombproof Broody!

so, today we went to the local council recycling center and picked up an old dog crate for $15! When we got it home, I cleaned it thoroughly with water and disinfectant (note: I have since found out it is not advisable to use disinfectant to clean equipment for backyard poultry. Warm soapy water will suffice) and let it dry in the sun for an hour or so.

The crate has "Pepsi + Diego" written on the top of it. It makes me wonder what animals used to use this before it came to us. We have set this up in the coop for our broody Sussex, Bertha. She seemed to tolerate the disturbance okay. We went up and did this just after sunset and I got her off the nest she had been using and put her near her water bucket. She was a bit stiff from sitting and kind of fell face first into the bucket. Note to self, put her further away from the bucket next time! She then proceeded to have a big drink of water. The other chooks in the pen next door were on the roost, but when they heard/saw her drinking, two of them came down and had a drink in their pen, too. It was rather cute!

We put fresh straw into the dog crate, and put her fake egg into it, then when she had eaten some food and had another drink, I tried putting her inside the crate. She fussed and clucked and then came out, acting frantic as though her egg was missing. I put her back in. Same deal.

Then my partner suggested we should get the straw from the old nest she had been using and put that into the crate. We did that, put her egg in there, put HER in there and waited.

There was some more clucking and fussing, and then a little noise that sounded like a cry of joy when she spotted her fake egg. She immediately settled on the egg, and that's how we left her.

She seems very determined to set, so I am going to organise some eggs for her early next week.

Oh, and while she was off the nest, she did a poop right at my feet, which was huge and omg!! The smell!!! I'd heard about these 'broody poos' but they seriously have to be smelled to be believed.

I suppose that was my just desserts for dropping her headfirst into her water bucket!

Spring has truly sprung. bukcluck!

In the springtime, it seems a young hen's fancy turns lightly to raising chicks!

Much as I would adore some little hatchlings trotting around after their mumma hen, I am not set up as yet for raising chicks, or for brooding them myself should the hen go off the set. :( I wish I could let her have some chicks, but I simply don't know enough and it would probably be unfair to her, and the babies.


I have heard that it is possible for eggs to hatch if you put them down your shirt/bra, but I am not keen to find out if that's true! Besides which, I don't even have fertile eggs as I have no rooster. I guess, clucky as Bertha and I may be, it will be the sin bin for her tomorrow if she is still setting.

Chooks (Chickens)

Growing up in Victoria, Australia, chickens, or chooks as Aussies call them were always just a part of life. My father kept a mob of white leghorns in a run along the back fence of our home in Geelong since before I was born. Growing up, the chooks were a common aspect of the suburban back yard. Almost every house had them, including roosters.

It's a different story nowadays if you live in the suburbs. No mobs of mad white hens flocking to see what scraps you've brought for them to pick at now. Maybe, if you're lucky you'll have four or five hens but certainly no roosters under any but the most clandestine and somewhat shady circumstances!

When I grew up and left home, I moved to a bigger city in Queensland, and chooks faded out of my life for many years. There was the occasional brush with a bantam at my childrens' schools, or sometimes we'd stroll through the chicken pavillions at the local show (fair) but the idea of keeping hens myself never really occurred to me.

It was not until my own kids had grown up and left the nest, and I moved onto a larger property in the country that I began to toy with the idea of a 'couple of chooks.' The house I live in now came complete with some preexisting chicken coops and although I talked about putting some chooks into them, I never actually went ahead and did it. Until May 2011 when my eldest daughter decided: "Damn it, I want my mother to have those chooks she's wanted for ages!" And coerced her siblings and her partner into buying me two hens for mothers day.

Thus, Rosie
















Isa Brown



And Boss:




















Utility Australorp

two young Point of Lay (POL) hens came into my life.

I was quickly enchanted (read obsessed) with everything chook related and found myself combing the internet for information, tips, tricks and whatever else I could find about keeping chickens. I joined forums, I read blogs, I followed facebook pages and before too long, I began to itch to have more chickens!

On one of the forums I joined, I found a section relating to wanted and sales and after falling in love with photos of Light Sussex hens that I'd seen in my crazed, late night google sessions, I decided to post in that forum asking if anyone lived nearby who had some of these hens for sale. An answer came more quickly than I could have dreamed and in nothing flat, I'd made an appointment to go and 'look' at some Light Sussex pullets with a view to possibly buying two of them to add to my flock.

The breeder we met that day, had not only Light Sussex, but also Wyandotte and several other breeds of chickens on show and whilst I was still enamoured of the idea of owning a Sussex, my partner's eye was caught by the pretty markings of the Wyandotte variety.

Thus Bertha:














Light Sussex




And Wynona:




















Gold Laced Wyandotte



joined our flock. For the time being we have drawn the line at four, but might look into some quail at a later date as well. These little creatures have enriched my life in more than just the eggs (80 of them since early June!) that they provide for our kitchen. Their antics keep me entertained for hours at a time as they scratch and peck around our little orchard. They are funny, smart, useful and each one has her own unique personality.

This blog is about the hens who grace my yard with their fluffy, feathered petticoats. I hope that anyone who stumbles upon it will enjoy reading about them as much as I enjoy keeping them!