Carol's Chickens

I am so up and down with Salmon at the moment. Yesterday Salmon was stretched out in the sun and I again felt a spark of hope.

Later in the day I tried to tempt her with mash and with sunflower hearts but she refused anything and I felt back down again. If she won’t eat then she has given up and that is the end of the road for her.

We decided to give her the weekend and make a decision on Monday.

Then this morning despite not having any sunflower hearts she was taking bits of spinach when I dropped them in front of her. She can’t exist on spinach alone but it gave me a little glimmer of hope once more.

Salmon had by now got a very mucky bottom again and I decided to clean her up. I thought that it would make her more comfortable and even if we ended up taking her to the vet I would feel better if she was at least cleaned up.

I held her over a bowl of warm water and started to clean her. The poop was white and hard and really stuck round her feathers. I had to gradually soak it off. As I was doing this a bit of soft egg shell appeared just sticking out of her vent.

I have been here with Marmite last year so I gently pulled the shell from Salmon’s vent.

I am feeling that we may now be in with a chance although it may already be too late. The egg itself must be inside her but I hope that continuing with the antibiotic tylan may be able to help stop an infection.

Salmon is in with a better chance having this out of her but it’s still too soon to know if it will make a difference to the outcome. We can only wait and see how she goes now. If I could just get her eating we may be in with a chance.

When separated in the cat box Salmon refused to eat the treats I put in her front of her and she won’t compete with the other girls either. I decided that I somehow needed to separate her from the competition.

I finely chopped some tomato, apple and spinach and added a little sprinkle of sugar for energy to a little dish. I lifted Salmon to the top of the small shelter and put the dish in front of her and also sprinkled some bits in front of her. I stood guard to keep the other girls from getting up there.

Salmon picked out all of the tomato. At least she had some even if not that much before she flew down off the shelter. I will keep trying to do this with different offerings. At the moment any food inside her is better than nothing.

A little later I put Salmon on top of the shelter again with some sunflower hearts and she ate them. I am now feeling a little more hopeful.

We can only wait now to see how she goes over the next few days.

I keep bouncing up and down with Salmon between a glimmer of hope and steeling myself for the most likely outcome.

I wrote some of this in the comments but will write it here for anyone who didn’t see. A little while after I had bathed Salmon and returned her to the run yesterday I picked her up to inspect her vent. There was a clear liquid dripping from her vent which I thought may be egg white.

I have read that if a girl has an egg stuck or broken inside them that sometimes if they are treated with antibiotic straight away it may stop a bacterial infection and they may pass the egg.

The year before last when Salmon was laying soft shelled eggs I once saw her pass a shell less egg. I wonder if this is what she has now.

I checked my store and I have some tylan that is still in date. I decided to put it in the water and some mash right away and we also used a syringe to put some directly into Salmon’s beak.

I not sure if this will save her but I have nothing to lose by trying and her comb is still red which is a good sign.

This morning Salmon was perkier and tucked into the tylan mash. I started to feel hopeful. Later I could see that she had poop hanging again and as the day went on she started looking miserable again.

This morning I was full of hope but now I am not so sure. Throughout the day she seemed to have better moments and then more miserable moments.

I don’t know if we can save Salmon but I have to give it a try. I will see how she is tomorrow.

Just when I thought that everything had settled down with the flock it looks like Salmon has a problem.

A few days ago we noticed Salmon was in the hunched position that usually means an egg laying problem. We wondered if she was heading for a soft shelled egg. Yesterday Salmon sat in a nest box for about an hour and I hoped that she would manage to get an egg laid but she left the nest box without laying.

Today Salmon has looked miserable.

Salmon started laying a month ago and had been laying about every three days. She last laid five days ago.

Salmon laid soft shelled eggs the year before last but last year it was if she was fixed and she laid normally all year. This year she has been laying fine until now.

I just don’t understand how they suddenly start having a problem laying. After Marmite it is so frustrating to be back here again.

I picked Salmon up to have a look and she had a very mucky bottom. Salmon often lays her eggs with a bit of poop on them so I suspect there is something not quite right with her.

I decided to bring Salmon in and give her a warm bath. I thought it would get rid of the muck and might relax her vent so that she could get her egg laid. I bathed her in warm water and then gently towel dried her then finished her off with the hairdryer on a low setting.

I kept Salmon in the cat box in the bathroom until she was completely dry then returned her to the run. I knew she would be happier out in the run. Salmon seemed to perk up a bit when back in the run but she soon returned to looking hunched again.

I am so upset to have this problem again so soon. I am afraid that she is going the same way as Marmite and if she can’t get an egg laid soon then we are going to lose her. This is so sad.

In other news Smoke has come through her broody spell. She has been out in the run for the last couple of days. We had our first, six egg day, at the end of last month when Ebony started laying again and only Spangle missed laying that day.

Ebony laid for two weeks then stopped again and we have only been getting one egg a day for the last four days. Two of these days were Shadow and one was Spangle and then today Ebony laid again after a weeks break.

I am steeling myself for not having a good outcome for Salmon and am feeling a bit disheartened at the moment. I feel we will know over the next few days and I will update with any further news.

Yesterday Flame went broody. Flame has been laying for six weeks and has never gone broody this early in the year before.

I don’t remember ever having three broody girls before. Loads of times there have been two as Smoke is a serial broody and will coincide with another girl from time to time.

This is a bit frustrating because Flame is one of our best layers. Flame lays two days out of three whereas Ebony lays every other day at best and hasn’t laid for the last three days.

This will leave us with much fewer eggs and not many of the bigger eggs. It also clogs up the nest boxes. Last night I closed all the nest boxes before bedtime as it also means moving three girls.

By closing the nest boxes it meant that both Flame and Smoke perched at bedtime. Sugar settled in the corner of the chicken shed but it meant I only had to lift one girl to the perch rather than three.

Ebony in the background is looking in the nest box because I have lifted the lid. She always likes to take a look when I look in but she didn’t go in.

I wonder if Flame laying her eggs beside broody Sugar has triggered her going broody. Flame does like company in the nest box and it’s not the first time she has been broody alongside a little girl.

I guess we are going to be having less eggs for a while. We won’t be able to gift any more for a while. Sigh!

Not only were all three nest boxes occupied at once but occupied by seven girls. Our flock seems to be diminishing! This morning there were only two girls out in the run and that was Spangle and Shadow.

Two broody girls clogging up the nest boxes is meaning that they are all three in use and some sharing is having to become the norm.

I grabbed my camera and took some photos.

It is so odd seeing so few girls out in the run these days. Luckily the two bigger girls are happy to share a nest box with the two broody girls.

When I went back to check a little later Shadow was in the nest box by the gate with Salmon.

There is an awful lot of nest box sharing at the moment. I don’t think all three nest boxes have ever been so busy.

It is great to see the girls sharing instead of shouting about it. A few moments later the egg shout went out. I went back to check.

Smoke was now in the nest box by the gate which is a nest box she never uses. I lifted her out and there were Shadow and Salmon’s eggs side by side. How did Smoke know there were eggs to sit on!

It never ceases to amaze me how a broody girl will always find the eggs. It is quite amusing to see the nest boxes being so well used at the moment. They are funny girls.

Smoke has now gone broody as well as Sugar. Smoke has laid eleven eggs in fifteen days which is her average before going broody.

I can’t believe I said recently that for the first time in a long time all the girls were laying. That didn’t last long.

Sugar is sitting in one nest box and Smoke in the next one along. Ebony and Flame have shared the nest box with Sugar today and Shadow has laid her egg in the third nest box by the gate. Salmon also did the same thing yesterday.

It’s the first time I can remember having all three nest boxes occupied. Usually the girls like to try to get in the favourite nest box but I think that as Shadow is so docile she preferred to choose a different nest box.

I lifted both girls out to get a photo. I love the way they are refusing to look at each other.

I lifted both girls from the nest boxes to the perch in the chicken shed last night and will continue to do this. It is a pain when more than one girl goes broody at a time but what can you do!

Since Shadow and Sugar started laying I have wondered if one of them would be a broody girl. Shadow started laying earlier than Sugar and once she hit her stride she proved to be a really good layer.

I thought this would probably mean that Shadow would be a broody girl because it tends to be the good egg layers that go broody.

However it turns out that it is Sugar who is the broody. Shadow has laid 24 eggs so far and Sugar has laid 14 eggs and then gone broody. This is a similar number to Smoke before going broody.

I first thought she was going broody when I would check the nest box and Sugar would growl and raise her tail. I thought this meant she was going to be one of those angry broodies. It turned out that she was just trying to get her last egg laid.

Once Sugar actually went broody she wasn’t angry at all. She will let me lift her from the nest box with no fuss. When I put her out in the run she sits for a minute then starts scratching away. She will have a scratch and some food and water before going back in and doesn’t rush back immediately. Maybe this is because it’s just her first time.

Ebony seemed to push her way into the nest box and Sugar just held her position. Flame prefers company in a nest box and will choose an occupied one if there is one so they seemed happier with sharing.

I later removed both Ebony’s egg and then Flame’s egg from underneath Sugar. Shadow chose to lay her egg in the nest box next to this one.

I am happy that when I lift Sugar she is docile and accepting. It’s much nicer than an angry girl. At bedtime I am lifting her from the nest box and perching her in the chicken shed and she perches happily without dropping down from the perch.

Sugar doesn’t shout when I remove her from the nest box unlike Smoke, sometimes, so that is a bonus too. Sugar is turning out to be a sweet broody girl so far.

It will be interesting to see how she long she will stay broody. The good thing is that we are getting plenty of eggs.

All the girls love to dig holes but Smoke is our current most avid digger. I say current because back in the day that title went to Cinnamon.

Cinnamon was our smallest girl but had big feet and we soon came to realise that she put them to good use. Cinnamon would dig holes that she would disappear into.

Smoke has taken this job over from Cinnamon. Smoke did this last year and I posted about it but I think it can take posting again.

Ebony and Flame can dig good holes because they are bigger girls. But their holes don’t compare with Smoke’s holes in comparison to her size. Smoke will dig a hole that she can disappear into.

Sometimes I go back to check on the girls and Smoke may be still digging away at her hole an hour later. I guess it keeps her occupied. The bigger girls come along and fill in her holes and then Smoke sets about making them again.

I fill in the holes when I clean up the run and Smokes makes them again. I figure it gives her a purpose. It also seems to be to do with the time of year because Smoke was doing this last year at this time of year.

Perhaps there are bugs to be had or perhaps it is just for fun.

I have to say that I do find it quite entertaining to watch. I am sure she is having fun.

I have always removed the top from our soft boiled eggs with a knife. A swift side ways cut through the top and remove.

However with the little serama eggs it’s a little more difficult. I think because they are loose in the saki cups holding them is much hotter on the fingers and the shells themselves are also harder and the whole operation is much more fiddly. Plus I have to do four instead of two.

My husband suggested that I look at gadgets to take the top off boiled eggs. I looked on Amazon and as I didn’t know what they were called I typed in to the search – taking the top off boiled eggs.

It turns out they are called egg toppers. The one I chose was the princely sum of £2.99 and free next day delivery. I couldn’t go wrong at that price.

I wasn’t sure if it would close small enough for a serama egg but I thought that if it didn’t work it would still be worth having for our winter medium sized shop bought eggs.

I was waiting to try this out before giving it a review.

In the mean time, in case anyone hasn’t read the comments, David said that his wife uses an upturned regular egg cup for bantam eggs. I thought this was a genius idea that I would never have thought of.

Left, regular egg cup, next it’s upturned and right serama eggs in the dip of the base. Thank you to David and his wife for this tip.

Now for my review of the egg topper. The next time we had soft boiled eggs I tried it. It didn’t seem to close tightly enough on the tiny egg and although it did make a cut it didn’t remove the top of the egg shell and I had to finish with a knife.

I decided to wait until this morning and try it on the slightly bigger eggs of Ebony and Flame. I thought this would work better but it was exactly the same. It crushed the shell a bit but didn’t remove it.

I squeezed it a bit harder and the egg topper came apart in bits. Well I suppose this is what I get for buying the cheapest one.

My husband put it together again easily enough. I will keep it for the winter and try it with regular sized eggs but I won’t bother using it again for my little eggs. Oh well, it was worth a try.

Over winter while our girls weren’t laying we were having a soft boiled egg and toasted soldiers for breakfast one day a week. It became one of my favourite breakfasts.

I hadn’t often done this with our girls’ eggs because I thought it would be difficult to judge the timings. However I decided on a bit of trial and error so that I would know for the future and I now have it down to a fine art.

I had to also take into consideration the two different sizes of my eggs. Regular bantam sized for Ebony and Flame and tiny serama sized for the rest of the girls.

It may help others as a starting point and then you can tweak it to suit your own tastes. I like my soft boiled egg to have a firm white but a liquid yolk to dip in. I like my hard boiled eggs to still have just a little softness to them.

With a medium shop bought egg I give them 5 minutes for soft boiled and 10 minutes for hard boiled.

With Ebony and Flame’s eggs I give them 4 minutes for soft boiled and 8 minutes for hard boiled.

With the serama eggs I give them 3 minutes for soft boiled and 6 minutes for hard boiled.

As we get many more serama eggs than the bigger ones it seemed more useful to get the timings right for these. The next problem was what to use as egg cups.

I have loads of regular sized egg cups of course. I have only one bantam sized egg cup that my youngest son gave me one Easter with a chocolate egg in it. It is perfect for Ebony and Flame’s eggs but not much use as there are two of us and only the one egg cup.

The serama eggs drop so low in the bantam sized egg cup that you wouldn’t be able to get at them. I then had a brain wave. I have four sake cups that were also a gift from my youngest son in the days when a lot of my gifts had a chicken theme. They have cockerels on them and sit in my kitchen display cabinet.

The eggs are loose in them but they are low enough to be able to get to the eggs and they actually work fine for us. It’s been nice to have a use for them rather than just decoration.

I have to cut the soldiers a bit thinner to dip in the eggs but this works perfectly. We are having this as our regular mid week breakfast and I love them.

Although the eggs are small you get more yolk ratio with smaller eggs so they are really lovely. I am pleased with myself for solving this. Perfect little eggs every time.