Théo and the chickens des Sauches

RoyalChick · May 4, 2023

ManueB said:
Feeling better ! The last few days have been bitter sweet with lot of stuff happening.

I'll start with the lemon : Brune is dying. She first had another access of what looks like internal laying, and she got unwell to the point she's unmistakably been leaving us for the last two days. I expect her to die tonight. I'm at peace with it, her respite was very short but I know she made the most of these numbered days. I'm just a bit sad that my partner is away for four days and won't be there.

Yesterday we got an appointment for Piou-piou to stitch her up. I only called the clinic on Saturday because the days before I thought she would not make it, and they told me to come Tuesday morning. It was just after a three days weekend and things were crazy on the road and at the clinic- it took us two hours and a half to get there and an hour waiting before they took her in. She has nice stitches and another course of antibiotics, and she's locked up in the woodshed until it's safe to let her dustbathe.
By the way she hated the tarpaulin and it took her three days to barely begin walking on it.

Léa had been a conscientious broody for a few days so on saturday we decided to let her hatch. She has three of her own eggs and we got four from the people I mentioned before where they have a nice rooster and a bunch of different hens. I have been taking her out as she doesn't come out on her own and she only stays for five minutes and doesn't even dustbathe ! Hopefully she will after a while. Théo and his team leave her alone, they are much nicer than they were with Chipie.

This means that Gaston is now alone with Merle, and he is now terrorizing the ex-batts by constantly trying to mate them. They run away but if he succeeds to jump on one she will crouch - from fright maybe?
Anyway, this has led us to decide on something I was opposed to. We are going to get a pair of adult layers from a local breeder. We can't leave Gaston alone with Merle until Piou-piou is healed and Léa leaves her chicks, and besides, I have a feeling Blanche will also die pretty soon. She is also having difficulties laying on top of her eye being painful.
There are no real breeders near our place, only breeders of hybrid layers. Some of the french hybrids type don't lay as much and are maybe hopefully slightly less prone to reproductive disease.
I'm happy to get new chickens - but I would have preferred getting dual purpose or some older breed.

Finally we had two wonderful surprises, not directly chicken related. We had two days of real rain this weekend . The last time it happened was in August! It's not enough to catch up, but just in time to not give up on the garden. Funny enough some friends we hadn't seen for a year that have a seven year old boy chose this precise two days to spend the weekend at our home!
And the next lovely surprise, though more trivial, is that our young almond trees have almonds for the first time! I think we planted them four or five years ago and we were sort of giving up on them. They don't have many, as is usual here for the first year, but I'm thrilled all the same !

Théo runs more often than not, but these days when they fight it's for real.
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CannelleView attachment 3491601
The unlikely couple.
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A rainy first of may ! Happy worker's day! Almost two million people on the street in France, but the way our president reacts he thinks they are all black box .
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Léa the day before she committed to sitting.
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Brune yesterday morning - last photo I took of her when she was still fully conscious.
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That is a lot of happening. Chickens seem to be an emotion roller coaster! I think more hens is a good idea and there is nothing to stop you adding some more heritage breeds later on.
What did the vet say about the dust bathing?
I continue to believe that dust-bathing is not a huge risk for her.

MaryJanet · May 4, 2023

ManueB said:
Great shot! I never thought of this, though it seems logical. I thought it was the hen's way of saying she agreed. I also didn't know what was a trail camera... so I learned two things from your post.
******
Murphy's law is also referred to as the law of bread and butter. In my family when we were kids we changed that to the law of jam and bread, because having the jam side of the toast falling on the floor seems so much more disagreeable than butter. Anyway, Théo has sprained his ankle (I think it's a sprain). It probably happened yesterday when he fought Gaston, I had to unstuck him again as he got caught in netting. I noticed this morning he was slightly limping and by the evening it had gotten much worse. I suppose I will have to isolate him but it's a bad timing with Gaston terrorizing his hens.

Brune is still (barely) alive. This allowed my partner, who came home earlier than expected from his extra job, to see her a bit tonight before he leaves for his regular job.

Piou-piou has become an escape specialist. The stitches look good but the vet said not to let her dust bath before ten days.

The she-devil stole again a piece of my dessert jumping on the table.
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Dustbathing in very slightly damp spoil. He waited until today so it had dried some but chose a spot that stays slightly humid.
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Three days after the rain and the grass has suddenly grown !
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Not a chicken : can you spot Grochatila? For once he is not sleeping.
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He's a good climber!

ManueB · May 5, 2023

RoyalChick said:
That is a lot of happening. Chickens seem to be an emotion roller coaster!

You know a lot about that.
Murphy's law goes on, this morning I opened the coop and found Cannelle with very foamy eyes.
I don't have enough place to isolate three different chickens separately

.

RoyalChick said:
I think more hens is a good idea and there is nothing to stop you adding some more heritage breeds later on.

If we have bacterial infection or a virus in the flock... plans will have to change

RoyalChick said:
What did the vet say about the dust bathing?
I continue to believe that dust-bathing is not a huge risk for her.

10 days without, but it maybe just to protect the stitches. I'm not sure as my partner saw her, not me.
Our ground is very rocky otherwise I would not be so cautious.

ManueB · May 5, 2023

Battery hens are vaccinated against IB so I think the most likely is Mycoplasma G. Her head is swollen, and there has certainly been a lot of stress for them recently with Gaston trying to get at them and the roosters fighting.
I'll call to see if the clinic does distance testing, I don't think so.

Perris · May 5, 2023

So sorry to read this; it never rains but it pours, as they sometimes say here.

If one chicken is showing symptoms, they've all been exposed to it already, so I don't think there's any point worrying about isolating Cannelle. I'm pretty sure we've had and therefore got both MG and MS here, so want to reassure you that it's not the end of the world. You can treat, but they'll still be carriers, and it'll still flare up, so I have let nature take its course. Some succumbed, and those left are naturally resistant, and have produced naturally immune/ resistant offspring (antibodies are passed on in the egg; breed only from 3+ year old birds). It's survival of the fittest and all that - it's hard going through it, but there's a reward, and that's the fabulous flock of very healthy chickens that I now enjoy.

Chin up! Grit your teeth and think long term (there'll be heartache for a few years).

ManueB · May 5, 2023

Perris said:
So sorry to read this; it never rains but it pours, as they sometimes say here.

If one chicken is showing symptoms, they've all been exposed to it already, so I don't think there's any point worrying about isolating Cannelle. I'm pretty sure we've had and therefore got both MG and MS here, so want to reassure you that it's not the end of the world. You can treat, but they'll still be carriers, and it'll still flare up, so I have let nature take its course. Some succumbed, and those left are naturally resistant, and have produced naturally immune/ resistant offspring (antibodies are passed on in the egg; breed only from 3+ year old birds). It's survival of the fittest and all that - it's hard going through it, but there's a reward, and that's the fabulous flock of very healthy chickens that I now enjoy.

Chin up! Grit your teeth and think long term (there'll be heartache for a few years).

I don't know what she has really, and like I thought, the vets don't do distance testing.
I suppose I have to wait. Right now she's acting completely normal and active apart from not laying. I rinsed her eye this morning and it still looked terrible throughout the day, maybe not as foamy. One eye is really worse than the other, so I'm not completely certain it's not some eye problem.
If it is indeed mycoplasma I realize that many chicken keepers and flocks deal with it, but the timing isn't great. We have six eggs under a broody and we either need to get more adult hens or re-home or cull one of the rooster. My only hen older than three whose eggs I could use would be Chipie, and she lays an egg the size of a big marble once in a fortnight

.

So today felt like chicken hospital, a field hospital from a poor country to be realistic. Piou-piou was locked in the woodshed, Brune I locked in the coop (she was in the run the days before but it wasn't really quiet), and at midday I put angry little Théo in a pet carrier. First I tried to have him in two bigger carriers joined together, but it really didn't do the job as he kept moving and thrashing around. So he ended up in a small pet carrier and it made him ever so angry he kept trying to attack my hand through the grid and wouldn't take any water from me. I gave him metacam and vitamin B. His leg is less swollen than yesterday, it's not warm, and I can't feel a fracture, however he was limping even worse this morning as he just couldn't put weight on it. Tonight I took him back to the coop, he's not putting his foot on the roost. We'll do a few days like this and see how it goes.

I got a real surprise this evening. With Théo out of the way, Gaston was a pain, chasing and mating the unwilling ex-batts constantly so I put him in the coop at 5, an hour before his usual roost time. I took Brune out before as I didn't want him to bother her. I went to water some stuff and when I came back, Brune was in the grass in the middle of the yard, having some girly time with her ex-batts friends ! She got up and walked down and up the slope several times.
I couldn't believe it.
I have actually already dug the hole to bury her - I thought it would be a bit of work as our soil is so hard, and she is the biggest of our hen- and I still think I will bury her in a few days, but obviously she doesn't think the same way.

Chickens are amazing.

Cannelle's bad eye. (She still has appetite seen how she gobbled up the rice and mackerel with a side of yogurt).

Théo hates the whole world and me especially. I get it, I would too in his place.

I took broody Léa out, she hesitated to dustbathe but changed her mind. Brune is behind in the coop.

Blanche looks ill.

before Théo was jailed.

Brune before roosting. She still looks near death but she had not gotten up on her feet for the last three days. She even climbed on the roost with my help.

My sole two toned irises have finally come out with the rain @RoyalChick .

RoyalChick · May 5, 2023

ManueB said:
I don't know what she has really, and like I thought, the vets don't do distance testing.
I suppose I have to wait. Right now she's acting completely normal and active apart from not laying. I rinsed her eye this morning and it still looked terrible throughout the day, maybe not as foamy. One eye is really worse than the other, so I'm not completely certain it's not some eye problem.
If it is indeed mycoplasma I realize that many chicken keepers and flocks deal with it, but the timing isn't great. We have six eggs under a broody and we either need to get more adult hens or re-home or cull one of the rooster. My only hen older than three whose eggs I could use would be Chipie, and she lays an egg the size of a big marble once in a fortnight .

So today felt like chicken hospital, a field hospital from a poor country to be realistic. Piou-piou was locked in the woodshed, Brune I locked in the coop (she was in the run the days before but it wasn't really quiet), and at midday I put angry little Théo in a pet carrier. First I tried to have him in two bigger carriers joined together, but it really didn't do the job as he kept moving and thrashing around. So he ended up in a small pet carrier and it made him ever so angry he kept trying to attack my hand through the grid and wouldn't take any water from me. I gave him metacam and vitamin B. His leg is less swollen than yesterday, it's not warm, and I can't feel a fracture, however he was limping even worse this morning as he just couldn't put weight on it. Tonight I took him back to the coop, he's not putting his foot on the roost. We'll do a few days like this and see how it goes.

I got a real surprise this evening. With Théo out of the way, Gaston was a pain, chasing and mating the unwilling ex-batts constantly so I put him in the coop at 5, an hour before his usual roost time. I took Brune out before as I didn't want him to bother her. I went to water some stuff and when I came back, Brune was in the grass in the middle of the yard, having some girly time with her ex-batts friends ! She got up and walked down and up the slope several times.
I couldn't believe it.
I have actually already dug the hole to bury her - I thought it would be a bit of work as our soil is so hard, and she is the biggest of our hen- and I still think I will bury her in a few days, but obviously she doesn't think the same way.

Chickens are amazing.

Cannelle's bad eye. (She still has appetite seen how she gobbled up the rice and mackerel with a side of yogurt).
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Théo hates the whole world and me especially. I get it, I would too in his place.
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I took broody Léa out, she hesitated to dustbathe but changed her mind. Brune is behind in the coop.
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Blanche looks ill.
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before Théo was jailed.View attachment 3493941
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Brune before roosting. She still looks near death but she had not gotten up on her feet for the last three days. She even climbed on the roost with my help.
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My sole two toned irises have finally come out with the rain @RoyalChick .
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Love the irises (and sorry about the field hospital).
I think I may have my first irises in a few days. Some have barely broken ground, but a few look like they are close to flowering.

ManueB · May 6, 2023

We got Théo off his roost at 5.30 when it was still dark and just before my partner left for work so we could have a look together underneath his foot, and we came to the conclusion that he probably hurt one or two digits (fingers ?). He has a kind of split between the second and the third seen from underneath, that looks very different from his other foot, and the foot is still swollen whereas the leg has almost gone back to normal. He spent most of his day sitting despondently on an egg I gave him in the pet carrier but he did get very angry and restless toward four, for about an hour. When he got back on the roost tonight, I think there was a small progress as he had both feet on the roost, which he had not done the last two days. I read in the bird splint guide that it's eventually possible to make a shoe to maintain the foot. If five days rest isn't enough I may try that.

Cannelle I have hope will defy Murphy's law. This morning on the roost she had her eye completely closed and the other looked almost normal. There was no foam and once I had rinsed it it looked slightly better than yesterday. I think (not completely sure yet) she got hurt in her eye, and she is not sick.
Good eye

Bad eye

Brune went back to her state of lying unconscious all day. In the evening she perked up a bit and got up to stand with her ex-batts tribe but she was obviously in pain, which is maybe not the case when she is asleep. And tonight she tried to get on the roost but I had to keep her from falling, and Gaston began annoying her

.

He is being a real jerk- he's late to the teenage horny phase, but he's catching up strong. He kept running after the ex-batts and even though they ran as fast as they could, he is way faster. I frightened him trying to get him out of their yard so I was running, he was running away from me and the ex-batts away from him

. What a circus.

Unusual sight : Blanche and Chipie stay together because they both want to be as far as possible from Gaston

I took Léa off the nest and not only did she not dustbathe, she also forgot to poop. I know it's not worrying for one day, we hope she's okay!

Four ex-batts.. not sure if it's the last picture of them together!

ManueB · May 7, 2023

Big gardening day today, I didn't have much time to take chicken pictures and anyway we alternated locking up the ex-batts / Gaston and Merle as it's impossible to leave Gaston unsupervised with them.
No major evolution health wise either good or bad.

At the end of the day when they had gone to roost we completely moved the netting to make a huge chicken yard, in the hope of keeping the chickens away from the garden. They will have a big surprise tomorrow.

Not chicken related : We've planted our second half of twenty tomatoes starts in the greenhouse, ten the neighbour gave us outside, pulled away the phacelia winter crop from the garlic and onions and hoed them, tilled the major part of the garden, sowed greens, cucumbers, zucchinis, chards, and planted starters of melons and watermelons. Tomorrow we still have to sow all the squashes (we do a huge amount of different kinds) and plant the chards starters, put the trainers for the white beans and sow those, and sow the red beans that don't need trainers. Then the first part will be done until another two weeks when we'll have to plant all the other starters, carrots, parsnips, and second generation of different greens. The only plants we buy the starters for are peppers, kale, and eggplants- we don't do well sowing those at home.

Anyway I have a language question. When I say we hoe the onions, we use this tool on the two teeth side, but I'm not sure hoe is the right name for it. I would appreciate any insight

.