august 10, 2017

Good morning, the joys and tribulations of owning fowl can be hilarious but also can be quite disquieting too.

It was interesting when we first got chickens there was some literature that said guinea's don't get along with chickens. The first hens we kept separated as best we could.

During the he early years with the guineas, they spent most of their days foraging and not in the barnyard very much except to drink and partake in afternoon scratch . Now that they are old birds, the stay in the barnyard. These white guineas will posture chase and in some cases pull a few tail feathers but nothing really violent. 

It was a few years back while washing dishes I noticed two new guineas in the back yard. They seemed to like our dinner table and so they stayed. These new birds were the traditional colored guineas with black and white plumage. 

For the first two months they all roosted together but soon they no longer mingled together. It got to be where the new birds attempted to roost in our mulberry tree instead of in the coop. This lasted for a few nights until a hoot owl took one out. The remaining one needed no more persuasion to come to coop at night. Instead of roosting with the other guineas he roosted in the other coop. This bird soon paired up with a barred rock and they became foraging buddies. This went well for several years until one day while harvesting tomatoes I was hearing a commotion behind one of the coops. Curiosity got the best of me so I checked out what was going on.

The black and white guinea had a barred rock cornered and was wailing on it's neck with its beak. It was not pretty. 

To make a long story shorter we will say the guinea met his Maker. In the second round of commotion the traumatized hen disappeared. I figured she just went off and died. It was a real surprise when I found her later that afternoon hiding in a shed. 

I took a look at her wound. It was nasty. There was a hole that was leaking air that shouldn't be there. A very small one but a hole none the less. I will say that I do not have a very good track record of nursing hens back to health so I was thinking this would be another exercise in futility, but we were going to give it a go. Most of the other hens that I have attempted to mend were off their feed, this hen never lost her appetite. This was her saving grace.

After a couple weeks the wound was one huge scar (no more"blowhole"). Hence her new name "scar neck". Scar neck continues to mend and her scar is not very noticeable, in fact has disappeared from plumage either regrowing or "dome wrapping " over the scar.

If it were not for a floppy comb and her terror to be around other birds she would look just like the other hens. There is a pen in the garden  she spends the day in and then roosts with the other birds at night.. I think she is calming down. time is always the healer. Maybe she will be egging soon.

Back to our Maker Meeter, I was absolutely disturbed to see this bird wailing on Scar Neck. What frightened me even more, would be if he started to show this "affection" toward other birds. This had to be stopped so that it wouldn't.

What I find to be a very curious behavior of mine is that when I am in flock protection mode I do not have a problem of taking out the perpetrator. But on the other hand culling hens is a very wide river that some how I can not cross. Even though culling would help increase flock health, it is a place I cannot go. 

Life's many mysteries!!!

This week I have harvested chard, kale, green onions, lettuce, beets, chilies, eggplant, yellow squash , zucchini and from storage onions, garlic and butternuts. Please email for availability.