Carol's Chickens

It sometimes seems that when ever I think things are going smoothly there is always another problem round the corner to throw a spanner in the works.

Every morning when I poop pick the chicken shed I always do a quick inspection of the perches and the walls of the shed just to check that there are no dreaded red mite.

For the last couple of mornings I have spotted little splashes of blood on the back of the shed, chicken head height, behind the perch. I know there is some pecking at bedtime (sometimes it seems quite brutal) and I inspected all the girls combs to see if they had been pecked. I couldn’t see any peck marks and was perplexed as to what was going on here.

Yesterday I thought that Butterscotch was having a bad hair day and put out this photo.

Butterscotch is having a bad hair day (yesterday)

This afternoon I realised this wasn’t just a bad hair day after all. Butterscotch is missing some head feathers and there is a spot of blood on her comb where the feathers have gone but with her comb being black it’s very very difficult to see. Yesterday her feathers looked swept back by the wind (and it was very windy yesterday) but I now think that the missing feathers in front of the swept back ones gave this appearance.

Today more feathers have gone and it has become more noticeable.

Butterscotch is missing head feathers

From a different angle

I have looked back at the recent photos of the bedtime line up and the blood spots are in the middle of the shed which is where Butterscotch perches and she is next to Honey in the last few photos.

I have watched the girls whenever I could today and haven’t seen any plucking. I am coming to the conclusion that it is probably Honey plucking her head feathers at bedtime and that has caused the blood spots.

I am so horrified by this. I have had this sort of problem in the past and can’t bare the thought of it happening again. I also know how impossible it can be to stop this behaviour.

I decided that tonight if Butterscotch was perched next to Honey that I would pick her up and move her to another spot on the perch. However Butterscotch solved the problem for now by perching between Topaz and Speckles so no action needed.

Tomorrow morning I will clean away the blood spots in the shed. I need to do this in the morning so that any damp patches have the day to dry. I will then be able to tell if there are any new spots.

I am hoping this is a phase (Butterscotch’s hair do may be irresistible) and that it will pass. I can’t bring myself to contemplate what it would mean if it develops in to full scale feather plucking. This is actually my biggest worry amongst my flock because of the past history. Honey was the only member that was part of the flock during that time and I hope this isn’t a behaviour that she is remembering and continuing.

I have to just hope this will pass because otherwise I don’t know what I could do next. I will be watching the situation very closely.

Butterscotch is having a bad day. She is often sporting a spiky hair style from standing under some drips but today it was really windy and it dried like this.

Butterscotch is having a bad hair day

Last night I put the corn pot down while I checked something and all the girls immediately started pecking at the tub but I didn’t have my camera.

Tonight I couldn’t resist putting the pot down while I had my camera. A bit of a tease, I know, but I gave them an extra bit of corn to make up for it.

I put the corn pot down and all the girls ran to it

Toffee was the first to peck at the lid.

The girls can’t work it out

Topaz has a peck at the side of the pot

Emerald has a peck at the lid

She tries the side of the pot

If they could only work out how to get the lid off they would have a feast. It’s a good job the pot has sturdy clips around the lid. What fun they would have if they could open this.

Yesterday I gave the girls some yogurt as a treat. I put it in four dishes with two spaced out on the patio area and one on each of the two wooden blocks. Despite spreading them out like this seven of the girls went to the four different dishes and it looked as if Speckles was still going to miss out.

Speckles really wanted some of the yogurt. She suddenly got braver and decided to try to take some.

Speckles is getting braver

Speckles gets some yogurt

Well done Speckles

I was so pleased to see her getting braver and getting her share of the yogurt. Well done Speckles!

Butterscotch was back in the nest box first thing this morning so I decided to lift her out and shut all the nest boxes. I would like to break her of being broody as quickly as possible and I hoped this would be before the other girls started laying. I felt this would be the last time I could do this as once there are other girls laying I will just have to let her be broody but make sure she comes out several times a day. Usually if I shut her out of the nest boxes she loses interest in just a couple of days.

Butterscotch is looking for the nest box

Butterscotch beside the blocked smaller nest boxes

I blocked the smaller nest boxes as I felt that if she went in one of these I wouldn’t easily be able to get her out again.

A disgruntled Butterscotch

Butterscotch decides to sit next to the smaller nest boxes

Barley checks her out

Barley then went into the chicken shed and started scratching around in there. I wondered if she was getting ready to lay and decided to put one of the smaller nest boxes in the chicken shed in the hope that if she did want to lay she would use that.

A little later my husband was by the chicken run when he heard a commotion. He said Barley was standing over an egg besides the food dish. Once again I felt really guilty that I had closed the nest boxes just as a girl wanted to lay.

It did prove that yesterday’s egg was Butterscotch’s though. Butterscotch’s eggs are a beige colour and are round. Peaches and Barley’s eggs are pure white and are oval. This first egg was long and slim. It doesn’t always show up in a photograph so I took one of the eggs laying down and one of the eggs stood up.

Barley’s egg is on the left and Butterscotch’s egg is on the right

Barley’s egg is quite different from Butterscotch’s egg

Now that she has laid her egg I will leave the nest boxes closed until at least mid morning tomorrow. Last year Barley started laying a week and a half before Peaches and missed a few days between eggs before getting into her stride so I may just have time to dissuade Butterscotch from sitting in the nest boxes. I will have to keep an eye on Barley and make a decision as we go along.

Today I had planned to write a post about the girl’s combs and how I can see by how red some of them are that some of the girls are getting ready to lay again. I took my camera with me each time I went into the run. Somehow as the day went along the post changed into Butterscotch’s day.

Butterscotch lays for three weeks then goes broody. Today is day twenty one. Yesterday she was in the nest box all morning and I was sure she was going broody. She has also started the clucking that she does when about to go broody. After lunch I decided to lift her and was surprised to find an egg under her. She didn’t return to the nest box after that so I thought maybe she has another day or two to go.

Today she went into the nest box first thing this morning. I took it as a sign that she is going broody as after laying an egg at lunch time yesterday I knew she wouldn’t lay one in the morning. She usually lays an hour later each day. I decided to leave her until midday then lift her out.

She was cross as she usually is, clucking away, but she went out for food and water and a scratch in the run. We wanted to go out for a few hours and I knew she would return to the nest box while we were out but I decided to lift her again on our return.

When we returned I lifted her out again and she sat flattened on the patio area.

I check on Butterscotch in the nest box and Barley has to check too

Barley has a look in the smaller nest box

Butterscotch is flattened on the patio area

As always when Butterscotch is going broody she remains flat after I lift her out. Peaches and Barley check her out.

It is as if Peaches and Barley are wondering what Butterscotch is doing flat like this

Speckles comb is getting more colour

Speckles comb isn’t as red as Peaches, Barley’s and Topaz’s but it is getting a bit more colour.

Honey is looking older

Some of the girls are one year old and some are two years old but Honey is three years old and is definitely looking older now. She is slower and more portly than she used to be.

At this stage I decided to close the little coop nest boxes to keep Butterscotch out and try to break her broody spell once more. I didn’t bother about the smaller nest boxes because she has never shown any interest in them and I thought she would be too big for them.

When I went in with the bedtime corn Butterscotch was missing. I thought she was probably in the chicken shed but decided to check the small nest boxes first.

Butterscotch is squashed into the smaller nest box

I was really surprised to see her in this nest box. The good news is that if Butterscotch will use this nest box then I feel sure the smaller girls will. Butterscotch is our biggest girl.

I can’t lift her out of here as the lid doesn’t open and she is too tightly squeezed in to take her out. Instead I put the small nest box down on the patio and rattled the corn container in front of her. She squeezed herself out and went off for the corn.

To my surprise there was an egg in the small nest box

I have to assume that it is Butterscotch’s egg as I haven’t yet seen any of the other girls go in the nest boxes. Several times when behaving like a broody she has laid one last egg. I felt quite guilty that she wanted to lay after I had closed the bigger nest boxes but at least it proves that these smaller nest boxes are acceptable. I reopened the little coop nest boxes as the drama was over.

At dusk I went to check on the girls. No girls were outside so I looked in the chicken shed.

Where is Butterscotch?

I checked the nest boxes.

Here she is

This means she is definitely broody as she is back in the nest box, after laying her egg, instead of going to bed. I lifted her out of the nest box and placed her on the perch just as the automatic door started to close.

I placed her on the perch

This photo shows how red the combs are on Topaz, Peaches and Barley. All the other girl’s combs are still paler. Butterscotch has a black comb but I know her routine so well. She lays for three weeks and today is day twenty one and then she goes broody. She has laid fifteen eggs this time and I am certain today was her last one for a couple of weeks.

She takes a two week break so it will be interesting to see if Peaches and Barley start laying during this time. Topaz is a law unto herself so I can’t speculate when she will start laying.

It would be lovely to have some eggs from some of the other girls as Butterscotch has single handedly kept us going through the winter. Butterscotch is an amazing character.

I have mentioned before that Butterscotch goes to bed quite a bit later than the rest of the girls. Last night I decided to photograph her.

Butterscotch is very much her own girl and has loads of confidence. Sometimes Topaz will give her a quick peck to let her know that she is below her in the pecking order but Butterscotch hardly flinches.

Very often all the girls will be perching on the ladders and branch perches but Butterscotch will be drifting around the run pecking and scratching. Sometimes she perches with them but not all of the time.

The girls go into the chicken shed about forty minutes before the automatic door closes but Butterscotch goes in about twenty minutes before the door closes. I often wonder how she knows when to go in but she has never yet missed the door closing.

Butterscotch at near dusk with her spiky hair do

The rest of the girls are getting into their bedtime positions

Butterscotch has some pellets then some water

Butterscotch looks as if she is about to go in

Is she going in?

The feet inside the shed belong to Peaches. She has jumped down so that she can jump back up again next to Barley.

She didn’t go in and is now pecking at stray pine shavings

She has some grit

Meanwhile the rest of the girls have settled

Butterscotch has some water

Now Butterscotch takes up her bedtime position

Jackie asked recently if the girls always faced a particular way. It seems to be quite random. I had thought that the first ones up with plenty of turning space would turn to face the front and those last up with no turning space would end up facing the back of the shed but I see in this photo that Emerald and Honey have space to turn but are facing the back of the shed.

It does appear to be completely random. The only constant is that Peaches and Barley always try to be next to each other and Butterscotch is always around the middle. It may be that because Butterscotch is last into the shed the middle position is the easiest place for her to jump up.

It is quite interesting to see how they line up and that Butterscotch doesn’t just follow the flock but very much does her own thing.

Today I went to a large garden centre and bought three large bags of compost that were on offer at three for the price of two. Yesterday’s bags were twenty litres but these bags were fifty litres.

Today I wanted to get the level of the run back to where it used to be so that I don’t have to keep doing it a little bit at a time. My mission was accomplished.

Three big bags of compost

Before I began I went in to check the nest boxes to see if Butterscotch had laid her egg while I had been out. As soon as looked in the nest boxes Peaches, Barley and Speckles jumped up to look too. It makes me laugh when they have to look just because I am looking. I missed the shot of Peaches with her neck down looking in the nest box but I managed a few photos of the three of them.

Peaches, Barley and Speckles check out the nest box

Nest box patrol

The compost bags are in the run

We dumped the compost in the run

I spread the compost

This was before we started building up the level

This is the level now

What a difference. I am really pleased with the new level of the run. My boot scraper on the left of the photo is no longer over hanging a foot drop. I am sure over the next few days the girls will enjoy scratching and mixing the compost with the soil.

Today I went back to our local D.I.Y. store for another bag of sand. After I had bought it and was on my way out I saw a pallet of bags of compost that had been split open and were reduced to sixty three pence each. I bought four bags for the run.

My bargain compost

I decided to put the sand in the part of the run that gets the most wet and boggy to help with drainage and put the compost in the spot where I am trying to build up the soil.

I dumped the bag of sand in the run first.

The girls investigate the new sand

This time it’s Barley that photo bombed the shot.

Topaz and Butterscotch were soon scratching in the sand

I dumped some of the compost in the run

The sand was immediately abandoned for the lure of the soil and Topaz was vigorously scratching in it.

I dump the rest of the compost in the run

All the girls enjoy scratching in it

The girls much prefer the compost to the sand and soon had it spread out.

Speckles gets her turn

After lunch I took the girls some apples and while they pecked at the apples Speckles made the most of having the compost to herself. She especially liked a bit of root that had been in one of the bags.

We decided to go back and get some more but it was already sold out.

At the end of the day when I gave the girls their bedtime corn my husband said that Honey had side stepped the sand on to a strip of soil next to it and come through the hatch rather than cross the sand. She really doesn’t like the sand.

I got the fork and mixed the sand with soil so that it’s not so obvious.

It’s a shame the compost was sold out so quickly but at least I got four bags. The compost is much lighter and easier to carry and the girls prefer it so I will be keeping my eyes open for any more reductions.

I know that I have already done a post on this recently but yesterday Peaches and Barley were dust bathing together as usual and I just find it so cute that I couldn’t help grabbing my camera again.

Peaches and Barley dust bathing together again

Communal dust bathing but once again Peaches and Barley dust bath together

Here we are again

They will squirm around and get up and sit back down and shuffle a little closer and peck some specks of goodness knows what from each other. They lean on each other and sometimes almost sit on each other and their toes curl in all sorts of odd shapes. The closeness of these two girls is obvious to anyone watching them and is heart warming.

Yesterday afternoon I was watching the girls in the run. They were all perched up as the ground was muddy after being frozen and then thawing and when I went in they all jumped down to come and see if I had any goodies for them.

Speckles was on the highest perch and it dawned on me that it was quite a jump down. The perch that is on the other side of the divider has a ladder to help drop down from the perch and the perch at the other end of the run is low on one end. The perch on the other side of the hatch has the table as a step down.

I felt a bit concerned that jumping from this height may be tough on the girls feet and this gave me a light bulb moment. We still had the ladder in the garden shed from the chicken’s shed when their perches had been higher. We had kept it in case we could find a use for it.

This would be perfect to give the girls a way down from this perch and also some extra perching space.

I dug the run over as it was so wet and muddy and then tried the ladder against the perch and decided it would be good there. At this moment my husband came to see what I was doing and said that as I had the ladder in position he may as well screw it in place. As it is hinged I can also lift it up to clean under it.

It was dusk by now so we thought we would wait until the following day for the girls to discover it. By mid morning the ladder was muddy so we knew the girls had tried it out.

I took some grapes into the run to try to get some photos of the girls on the new ladder. I put the grapes at the top of the ladder and waited to see who would be first up.

A second ladder in the right hand section of the run

Note it is much cleaner than the old ladder on the left hand side of the run but has some mud on the rungs meaning the girls have already tried it out.

Thinking about it

Toffee has spotted the grapes at the top of the ladder but can’t seem to work out what to do next. Peaches is also thinking about it.

Peaches and Barley are the first to make their way up the ladder

Peaches is first up closely followed by Barley.

They are working their way up the ladder

Peaches has made it to the top

Once at the top Peaches couldn’t work out how to get to the grapes.

Now what!

And back down again

Peaches jumped down as they did before but Barley went back down the ladder. At least now they have that option.

I retrieved the grapes and sprinkled them on the patio for the girls. I am pleased with the new ladder. It was sitting in the shed doing nothing and is now back in use again. I am sure there will be many future photos of the second ladder in use.