Chicken Anniversaries and remembering those we have lost,



Meet Chica, she is like the reincarnation of Mira which I lost over a year ago. Chica is very small, compared to the other Buff Orpingtons and it seem like somebody took a piece of her comb out. When she was a baby I noticed she had trouble eating the cooked spaghetti pieces or anything else I held out for her, somehow she has trouble coordinating how her beak works. Everything looks normal and I don't believe eyesight is the problem, she just is not very coordinated when it comes to eating. Her stunted growth is not due to lack of food intake, I do check and her crop gets full just like the other chickens. Just one of those things. She is very smart and she follows me around always begging for handouts.

My Ameraucanas are 2 years old now and they went through their first molt this winter. In the foreground is one of them who is just finishing her molt, I think all the others are done, maybe one more, but I am not sure. The ones with beards are really having big beards and ear muffs now.

Daisy the mystery pullet. She has grown a bit, but her eggs are still small, but a very pretty color and the egg shell is very shiny and smooth. I recently visited somebody who has game chickens and he had one that looks just like Daisy, so my guess is that she is a mix between a game chicken and an Ameraucana. She is very agile and fast, very smart too. I have watched her faking that she found a pile of food and when the other chickens leave the food in the bowl to check out what Daisy has, she runs over to the bowl to get her share. She is very flighty, but otherwise she is exactly what I like in a chicken.

Another one of my Ameraucanas, she has such a pretty golden color

Tippi the Barred Leghorn and one of the Ameraucanas

Here is one of my one year old Barred Rocks, what noisy birds they are, I won't be getting any more of those.

Look at this pretty hen, another Ameraucana, 2 years old with full beard and muffs, I would like to get some white or greyish ones of this breed

this Ameraucana has a clean face, no muffs or beard, she came with the same batch

another one of the Ameraucanas

Daisy on the right with one of the Ameraucanas, Daisy is almost a year old

This is Chica running towards me, she always wants to be first in the hope I have some treats for her

Chica, or Miss nosey bird

And here comes one of the flagship Black Jersey Giants

I have 4 of them and they are my youngest birds, born in April last year. they are very pretty, but they are huge. One is bigger than the others, my guess is she weighs 10 lbs or more, the others are probably 8 lbs or so, they are difficult for me to pick up due to their large size. They are very calm birds, but are easily spooked and then the completely loose it.

That's another Black Jersey Giant. Their black feathers have a green shimmer to it.

This is Sir Oliver, he is the only rooster left and he has also lost a few feathers to the dogs as he recently had to run ins, one time he was attacking me and got out the gate with me when I didn't notice it, another time I didn't see what happened but saved him from Cici who was trying to play with him. Now he is scared of the dogs, but he continues to attack me, I wish he would be scared of me and leave me alone. Unfortunately both Taz and Goldie escaped the safety of their chicken yard, Nanuk caught and killed Goldie, Taz I found buried under a tree with Enya guarding the body. No more banty roosters for us, that did not work out well. There are also still a few hens who don't like Oliver and fight with him. But he is undeterred, or shall I say single-minded, he flirts with the hens and attacks me.

Tippi, and the other following pictures are my 3 year old hens from my first batch of chickens. She is doing well but she only lays shell-less eggs

Buffy hasn't been laying any eggs since she injured her left leg about a year ago. She gets around okay, but in the mornings I have to lift her down from the perch, she waits for me to get her, which I believe is pretty smart. It's not like she likes to be picked up, but she seems to understand that it hurts less and is safer if she lets me give her a lift.

Bella is also very flighty and pretty agile, she occasionally lays a cream colored egg, about twice a week on average, she is also three years old from my original batch

And this is Pearl, unfortunately we lost her sister to the same illness that Pearl had, they were both sick at the same time, but Pearl made a recovery and started laying eggs again and Bianca kept getting sick over and ultimately died. So I am looking to add some more white chickens at some point as I only have one left.

Happy 3 year birthday to Pearl, Bella, Buffy and Tippi - I hope there will be more birthdays to celebrate for us.

From what I can tell, the main problem that has afflicted my chickens may have been extermal and internal parasites like mites and worms that keep the chickens anemic and weaken their systems, which then leaves them open to other diseases. I am on a mission now to make their environment safer by eliminating those pests and making changes to their sleeping areas so they can live healthier and longer lives. We don't have any fleas and ticks here and I never thought that birds could have so many problems with parasites as they do when exposed to the wild bird populations. So identifiying the problem was the first step in making things better. Daisy really helped with that as she came here last, she had good color and started laying eggs within weeks of getting here. I watched her very closely for any signs of illness and despite my applications of poultry dust in their sleeping areas, I noticed that she started scratching and turned paler, so I have taken action on this and everybody is starting to look better including Daisy. I wish I had known this from the start, maybe some of the ones I lost would still be alive.