Carol's Chickens

I have touched on this in the comments but I thought I would do a proper post for anyone missing the comments.

Dandelion is always the girl to suffer in cold weather. I think her frizzle feathers are not so insulating as the silky and straight feathers. To add to this she is moulting and has had pins only on her head for months. She of all the girls could do without not having head feathers in winter.

Dandelion this morning

Recently I could tell that Dandelion wasn’t as happy as usual and at bedtime I could hear a slight wheeze from her. I started another five days of tylan in the water. I stuck my head in the shed each evening to have an, up close, listen to her and for three evenings I could hear her wheeze.

Last night I could no longer hear Dandelion wheezing so I think she has come through again. Tomorrow will be the last day of tylan for this time round. I think it was the couple of frosty days that we had that kicked this off again.

It seems that every time we have frost Dandelion is set back but she continues to come through so I stay vigilant and treat at every set back.

Dandelion is better than last year when she used to get bubbles in her eyes. This hasn’t happened this year which I think is because it’s been a milder winter so far and maybe if she had head feathers she might not have had the wheezing.

Since the myco came into our flock I have always known that Dandelion was the most vulnerable girl. Last winter my husband delivered a lunch for a talk given by an exotic bird specialist who kept parrots and his wife had chickens. My husband told him of our experiences and he said that the eye bubbles meant that Dandelion was the carrier.

I have done loads of research on mycoplasma and have not come across anything saying this but it did make me wonder if that was the case. I did wonder if we didn’t have Dandelion in our flock would we remain free of myco in the future.

The situation is though, that we do have Dandelion in our flock and I love that quirky little girl. Dandelion is like the cat with nine lives, she keeps bouncing back. The more times she keeps bouncing back the more attached to her I become.

Dandelion survived her first year of laying soft shelled eggs and looking unwell before each one and went on to lay good shelled eggs the next year. Dandelion survived repeated bouts of myco flare ups with sneezing, wheezing and eye bubbles last winter.

Dandelion came back from a prolapse in the summer when other girls hadn’t survived it and she continued to lay eggs afterwards. Dandelion is a survivor and how can you not love a survivor like her!

Dandelion along with Cinnamon and Speckles is also a top girl. No girl pushes Dandelion around. Speckles will peck all the other seramas if they get in her way but never these two. Speckles considers these two her girls and looks out for them. She will still call them to the treats while keeping the other seramas away from treats.

Ebony is second in command behind Speckles and is a bit of a thug. She will peck and chase at Flame and all the seramas except Dandelion and Cinnamon. Being part of the flock the longest really counts as part of the pecking order and I would put Speckles, Dandelion and Cinnamon in joint top place.

This means that there isn’t an extra worry of Dandelion being bothered by other girls. Dandelion is firmly placed at the head of the flock and is first to the treats and bothered by no other girl.

So in conclusion I would say that even if Dandelion is a carrier, which we can’t know for sure, there is nothing to be done but to treat each time myco rears it’s ugly head again. I will always stay vigilant. I will always make sure I have a stock of tylan. I will always treat as soon as I see any symptom.

It will recur at times of stress and I think that frost is the stress trigger for Dandelion. Since I have known about myco and have treated with tylan each time I haven’t lost a girl to it. I think Dandelion will always be the most vulnerable to this but I think that by continuing as I am doing we should be able to safely come through this each time.

I am much more positive about this, this year, than I was last year. I hope we have Dandelion for a long time to come.

When Marmite started laying she laid two tiny, teeny, eggs on her first two days running. Marmite then missed two days and then laid a normal sized egg which was only a tiny bit smaller than Smoke’s egg. Marmite then laid four days running and her eggs were smaller than Smoke’s eggs so it was easy to tell which was which.

The day before yesterday there were two, Marmite sized, eggs in the corner of the shed by the pop hole in the late afternoon. There were no other eggs that day. First thing the next morning was a larger, Smoke sized, egg in the same corner of the shed.

This made me think that the smaller egg with Marmite’s egg belonged to another girl just starting as it was unlikely that Smoke would lay a small egg in the late afternoon followed by a larger egg first thing in the morning. It was too soon for another egg and unlikely that if two were laid close together the second would be larger rather than smaller.

Egg roller

It’s difficult to show the difference in size in a photograph but there is a noticeable difference in the flesh.

Smoke’s larger egg from yesterday morning is on the left. Next is the mystery egg (also slightly darker as the smaller eggs usually are) and Marmite’s egg, followed by Marmite’s egg from the day before and then Smoke’s egg from the day before is on the right. Smoke’s eggs are also rounder in shape.

I realise that when I have nine seramas laying it will be impossible to keep track of which egg belongs to which girl but I felt frustrated that I didn’t know who the new layer was. No different girls had shown any interest in the nest boxes and I hadn’t seen Marmite go in the shed either so I had missed the whole thing.

Today the mystery was solved. Spangle was very vocal from the moment I started cleaning out the chicken shed first thing. Smoke was in her usual corner of the chicken shed and Spangle joined her there.

The next time I checked on them Marmite was in the middle nest box. Spangle was still very vocal and was behind the nest boxes and looking under each one. It was as if she knew that Marmite was in the nest box but couldn’t work out how to get in. I picked her up and put her in the nest box nearest the shed to show her where to go.

Spangle stayed in the nest box and for a little while Smoke joined her then moved on to the middle nest box to join Marmite.

The next time I checked there were two eggs from Smoke and Marmite in the middle nest box, one larger egg from Ebony in the nest box next to the storage cabinet and Spangle was settled in the nest box nearest the shed where I had put her.

I put Spangle in the nest box

When Smoke and Marmite started laying they would run from the nest box if I lifted the lid. Spangle is a much friendlier girl and was happy to have me photograph her.

Smoke joined Spangle in the nest box

Marmite was in the middle nest box

Spangle settled in the nest box

When I next checked on them Spangle was out in the run and there was no egg but I felt happy that I now knew which girl the mystery egg was from. I also feel that Spangle has now learned how to get in to the nest boxes.

Well done Spangle!

The moult seems so late this year, late as in as much as, it started in December and has now tipped over into January. Flame, Dandelion and Cinnamon all stared their moult in December.

The odd thing about moulting is that tail feathers seem to grow really quickly. We seem to see Flame’s tail getting longer each day. But pin feathers on heads seem to take forever. Dandelion has had pin feathers on her head for ages. At one point I said that they seemed to be finally opening as she had some fluff on her head. I now think that may have been the last fluffy feathers to fall out as her head is entirely covered in pins now.

Dandelion and Cinnamon spend a lot of time in the small shelter when it’s cold and every day I find Cinnamon’s feathers on the ground inside the shelter. She has loose wing feathers and pins on her neck and head.

Flame’s tail is growing back

Flame facing the other way

Cinnamon has pins on her neck

I had to catch her drinking to show her neck.

Cinnamon and Dandelion both have pins on their heads

Dandelion’s head of pins

Cinnamon’s pins on her head

It is really frustrating because these two don’t have head feathers at the coldest time of the year. I am willing those pins to open as they need those head feathers. You can see some feathers on the ground below them which have fallen recently as it’s not long since I picked them all up.

Dandelion is now dropping tail feathers too. If only we could choose when they moult then I would have them moult much earlier when the weather was warmer but it is out of our control.

I can only keep willing those feathers to come through as soon as possible.

I am a bit late posting this because due to both lots of family being away before and during Christmas we hosted both Christmas dinners, celebrations and gift exchanging after Christmas. This then ran us into New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day before I had time to do this post.

I said in an earlier post that at that point I hadn’t had any chicken related Christmas gifts. That was to change and I received Chicken gifts from both lots of family. I loved my chicken gifts and our gifts have all been so thoughtful.

The  most unusual gift was a chicken stamp set from eldest son, wife and grandson. It has food grade ink so that I can stamp our eggs if I want to gift them but I like the idea of using it on stationary, envelopes, gift tags etc.

Eldest son asked me if I recognised the chicken and I wondered how I was supposed to recognise a breed of chicken from something so tiny although there was something familiar about it. It turned out it is the rusty chicken which is my avatar and also appears as the header on my blog.

I bought the rusty chicken when we were setting up the chicken run before we got our first chickens. It has remained outside the chicken run ever since and with the help of eldest son we used the image of it for my blog header and my avatar.

This is such a lovely personalised gift.

My stamp set

Rusty chicken stamp

Chicken prints

My avatar stamp

From youngest son and fiancee a note book with a great message on the front.

Note book

From son and daughter in law and grandchildren some kitchen items.

Oven glove and tile

We had lots of lovely gifts but this post is just to show the chicken related gifts. I never tire of chicken related gifts and they are all lovely. I am so lucky.

Edit – I missed one of the chicken gifts because I had put them away in our kitchen display cabinet with my collection of chicken egg cups.

Salt and pepper pot

Happy new Year to everyone. We have started New Year’s Day with an egg from Ebony, Smoke and Marmite. Marmite’s third egg is a much bigger size than her first two. It is what I would consider as a normal size.

New Years Day’s eggs

This morning’s eggs plus Marmite’s last egg for size comparison. On the left is Marmite’s last egg followed by her egg laid today. Next is Smoke’s egg and on the right Ebony’s egg.

I am amazed that although there has been a huge change over of girls coming and going this year the egg total is very similar to last years.

Last year we had 439 eggs and this year we have had 431 eggs.

Sadly only Speckles, Dandelion and Cinnamon have completed the year and I can hardly really count Speckles as she is such a poor layer.

Speckles laid 12 eggs in 4 months giving her an average of 3 eggs a month.

Dandelion laid 61 eggs in 7 months giving her an average of 9 eggs a month.

Cinnamon laid 78 eggs in 9 months giving her an average of 9 eggs a month.

Sadly we lost Apricot in April before she had started laying.

Sadly we also lost Freckles in June. Freckles laid 38 eggs in 4 months giving her an average of 10 eggs a month.

I was heartbroken to lose Emerald in July but she was one of the few girls that we had got to old age. Emerald laid 24 eggs in 3 months giving her an average of 8 eggs a month.

We got Ebony in July. She must be in her first year as she is still laying and hasn’t moulted. Ebony has laid 106 eggs in 18 months giving her an average of 18 eggs a month.

We got Flame a week after Ebony in July. She stopped laying at the end of November and started to moult heavily so we think she may be 2 years old. Flame laid 97 eggs in  in 5 months giving her an average of 19 eggs a month.

We got the two silky girls at the end of May and they haven’t started laying yet. Silky feathered girls mature slower than girls with frizzle or straight feathers. We think they are about 9 months old.

We got the five amigos at the end of August. We think they are about 6 months old as some of them are just starting to lay.

Smoke has laid 16 eggs in 1 month so has laid an average of 16 eggs a month.

Marmite has only just started laying and has laid 2 eggs in 4 days so I can’t give her a monthly average yet. Her first 2 eggs were the tiniest eggs we have ever seen.

We have 3 of the amigos yet to start laying. Yet to lay are Sienna, Jasmine, (silky girls), Vanilla, Spangle and Salmon (amigos).

It will be interesting to see how many eggs we get this year when all twelve girls are laying. I am anticipating some dramas over the nest boxes too, despite having 3 nest boxes, plus the chicken shed.

So to conclude – Speckles is hopeless at laying  (3 per month) and has laid half the eggs she laid the year before. Speckles is about 4 years old.

Freckles, while we had her, Dandelion and Cinnamon were/are better layers (9/10 per month). Dandelion and Cinnamon are 2 years old.

Ebony and Flame are excellent layers (18/19 per month). We think Ebony is 1 year old and Flame is 2 years old.

Then we come to Smoke. Although I put her average at 16 eggs per month (because I had only one month to count) she actually started laying a week into the month so her average will be higher. In reality she laid 16 eggs in 21 days so her possible average could be higher. She was laying 5 eggs per week so could potentially average 20 per month. Only time will tell but this is amazing for a serama in my experience up to now.

The silky girls and the five amigos are from a different breeder to my previous seramas so it will be interesting to see if they are all good layers or if Smoke is exceptional.

However it turns out I feel very lucky to be getting eggs at this time of year and with twelve girls laying later this year there should always be plenty of eggs and no need to buy any which will be lovely.

Well done to all my girlies.

I have recently posted about each of the amigos except for salmon. First I did a post on how much Vanilla had changed since we first got her. I then did a post on Smoke starting to lay. I did another on Marmite starting to lay and then one on how much Spangle has changed since we got her. I thought it only fair to do a post on Salmon.

Salmon actually hasn’t changed at all since we first got her. She has kept the same pretty markings she has always had, the salmon colour that she was named for and has remained the smallest of the amigos. She is similar in size to Cinnamon who is our smallest girl. Salmon is just a little bigger than Cinnamon but smaller than all the other seramas.

Salmon is so pretty

Salmon

Salmon’s markings from above

Salmon also has a very sweet nature. I am glad she has stayed just the same.

I would like to take this opportunity to wish all my readers a Very Happy New Year!

Yesterday afternoon I knew that Marmite was about to lay her second egg. It was only the day after her first one but she was very vocal and then after trying out all the nest boxes she settled herself in the middle one.

Ebony and Smoke had both laid in the middle nest box that morning so this is obviously the current favourite. This time Marmite was out after about half an hour. I checked the nest box and had to smile. There was another tiny egg.

It was slightly bigger than the first one and this time it was egg shaped instead of round and smooth instead of having a calcium blob on it.

As a comparison I am showing her first egg again before the second egg.

Marmite’s first egg sat on a pound coin

Marmite’s second egg sat on a pound coin

And second egg next to a pound coin

And on an egg roller

Marmite’s second egg on the left, Smoke’s in the middle and Ebony’s egg on the right. So it’s a three egg day of sorts!

She has done well to lay two days running and I am imagining that they will get a bit bigger each day. Once again I am interested to see what the next one is like.

I did a post a while back about how much Vanilla had changed since we first got her. She started out vanilla in colour with a few honeycomb spots and has ended up mostly honeycomb coloured.

Spangle has also changed just as dramatically but it’s the other way round. She started out mostly brown and black with a white breast. I thought she looked like a turnstone and the breeder described her as looking like a penguin because of her white breast and dark back.

Spangle is now mostly white with just dark spots and her once all white breast also has some dark spots. I actually think she is much prettier now. She also has a magnificent wide tail (much like Freckles had) which is all white but with one dark top feather.

The five amigos when we first got them with Spangle on the right

Spangle at the front of the group

Notice Spangle has an all white breast and almost all dark back.

Spangle has an amazing tail

Spangle is now dotted with dark colour

Her breast now has dark spots too

Her back is now mostly white with dark splodges

I think she has grown more beautiful as I like seeing more white and it shows up her unusual dark spots. It is funny how Vanilla and Spangle have changed so completely whereas Smoke, Marmite and Salmon have stayed the same as they were as chicks.

Marmite finally got her first egg laid today a week after she first started practising. She had been sitting in the nest box for almost an hour so I was sure that today was going to be the day.

What a surprise her first egg was. It is the tiniest egg we have ever seen.

Marmite is determined to get her first egg laid

Marmite’s first egg

Ebony’s egg is on the left, Smoke’s egg is in the middle and Marmite’s teeny, tiny, egg is on the right next to a pound coin for size comparison.

Marmite’s first egg sat on a pound coin

And next to a pound coin

It has a calcium blob on the top.

Marmite’s perfectly formed, teeny, tiny, first egg

These tiny first eggs are often called “wind eggs” because sometimes they are empty or just have white in them but this one has a tiny yolk surrounded by white.

I am amazed that after a week of trying to lay Marmite has laid such a tiny egg. It will be interesting to see what her next egg is like. Well done Marmite!

I haven’t so far received any chicken related gifts for Christmas although not all our family gift exchanging has been completed yet.

I did however receive this gift as a thank you for feeding youngest son’s and fiancee’s rabbits while they were on holiday shortly before Christmas.

Cute little fella

Cockerel

Strictly speaking I would say he is a cockerel due to the large comb and wattles although what variety I couldn’t say. I was really pleased with him. He is such a cutie!