She is probably one of my sweetest hens, but when she’s broody she is the loudest and meanest of all my other chickens lol

My hen, Chubbie, is super friendly. She likes to follow me around and she always allows me to pick her up. However, she never seems to like being pet and held. I really want to cuddle with her, because she's basically a dog and super endearing. Does anyone know if there is a way to teach her that pets are actually quite pleasant, or if this is permanent? I've successfully taught stray cats what pets are, and they've realized they like pets and learn to come back for more (that's how I've tamed them), but chickens seem pretty different.

Doesn’t stop them from trying though!
And please ignore the mess. I’m cleaning out my barn and of course the chickens have to get involved 😅

Their favorite treat

I need help one of my girls isn't doing too well. A neighbor brought her over after she escaped last night. My partner said she is bloody and that she is not weak and just breathing. I know she won't make it through the day I just need help knowing what to do after she passes away please comment your advice what should I do? How do I make her comfortable

I have a 10 year old hen and she's been gasping and sneezing a lot. Physical exertion causes her to have sneezing and gasping episodes (literally just 5 minutes of her sneezing non stop). None of my other birds display respiratory issues (tho it could be a case that there is some respiratory disease in my flock, but she's the only one displaying it because her immune system is worse..?)

Currently helping her on and off perches and keeping food and water near where she sits.

Anyone come across something similar/ have any ideas what's causing it??

Hi,

I have a 6 year old girl whose been egg-bound for around 24 hours now. Yesterday, I gave her an Epsom salt bath, and I’ve given her another one today as well as some crushed-up Tums.

She's actually been egg bound twice before but usually a warm soak is enough. I'm really worried and am not sure if I should isolate her in a dark box as she hates being away from her coop. She's currently in her nesting box right now and is very lethargic.

Is there anything else I can safely do to help her, or any advice on keeping her comfortable? I’m especially worried about making things worse by trying to help her pass the egg myself.

Any advice or experiences would be greatly appreciated. Thank you ❤️

he has been getting slightly sluggish the past week. his head movements are becoming slow compared to his brothers. intstead of being able to move his head almost instantly when he pecks food, he has been moving his head slowly. however, I am not sure what is wrong with him. he was able to eat on his own up until today, where I now have to place a few pieces of feed on my hand for him to eat. I took him to my room to attempt feeding him and I managed to help him eat. I'm not sure what is making him slowly go lethargic. and the only clue that I have left is trying to see if something is wrong with his droppings, so I waited for him, and it just happened to be on my bed. I took a picture and then cleaned up. to me, it looks like he has diarrhea. but I'm not very good at this, it may be something else. and even if it was diarrhea, I don't know what is the course of actions that I should be doing is.

for now I give him a tiny amount of salt for electrolytes, fed him, and let him drink sugar water, but I don't know what to do next. I suspected that his lethargy may be because of bullying. so I brought him back out and placed him next to my other roosters, but all the other roosters avoided him rather than attacked him, with some even running away from him. so it can't be because of bullying. he was in a strong rooster before he became lethargic so they are all wary of him. but what do I do now? do you see anything wrong with the droppings? what should my course of actions be?

Hello, amateur at rearing chickens here.

So I currently have 11 roos and would like to cull some, both for eating and to thin the amount a bit. How should I pick the ones to cull?

All 11 are generally pretty tame with me and none are weak/sick, but some of them do crow a tad too loud. Is it wise to cull these loud ones, since I've heard stories on how the more silent, less dominant roos crowing even harder when the loud/dominant ones are gone.

I also have a few that still haven't grown their tail feathers despite being 8-9 months old- should I pick based on that criteria instead and keep the ones that are practically more fully-grown?

Hi all, unfortunately we just lost our beautiful ISA Brown, named Sage. Not sure what happened, she had been acting nornally all week and seemed happy and active. I checked on them this morning around 9 and she was in the nesting box, with her head down. I figured she was just sleeping in a weird way because some of them roost with their head hanging down. When I touched her, she sat up and stood up and then repositioned in the nest so I figured she was just trying to lay. I found her tonight around 6, still in the nesting box and she had passed. No signs of disease or infection, her vent is clear/clean, no discharge from the eyes or nostrils, so I have no clue what happened. My vet friend basically said that anything so sudden like this is very unlikely to be a sickness or disease and that our other 5 ladies are probably okay.

My instinct is to analyze the last week to try to remember any signs in her behavior or any symptoms I might have missed but I just can't think of anything I could have done differently. :(

Just wanted to share my experience. Thanks everyone! RIP Sage.

My neighbor's newest dog ran through my chicken wired gate into the run where my babies and their coops are earlier today. I chased him out when I heard the commotion. Udon (my white-ish turken who's also an angel - she's soo so sweet) is in remission right now. I hope she makes it. Unagi, the black turken with her little afro head poof (I loved her and her hat), did not make it. Everyone else had scrambled and some hopped the gate (found soon after), stuck themselves in the corners behind our rain barrels, and jumped up as high as they could until I got there. The neighbor and I talked about it about a half hour after.

I'm not mad at them, I feel like I could be a lot of things right now/have a lot of feelings. I just wanted to share what few pictures I had of Unagi (I've had her since August as a new baby chick) in remembrance of her.

• the second picture has the fluffy but of Udon whom I'm hoping makes it through and am currently resting next to in her recovery crate

ETA: I don't use supplemental light. I want my girls to rest when needed. I'm not asking for opinions on this issue, but simply if this statement is accurate. lol

Someone posted this in a FB group I'm in, in reference to using supplemental lighting to get your hens to lay in the colder months. Is this true?
"Your hen hatches with all the eggs she'll ever lay in her lifetime. Laying through winters will cause her to stop laying younger, since she will run out of those eggs sooner."

We had a broody hen a while ago and a friend gave us some fertilized eggs, not sure what breed(s). Pretty sure just some backyard hybrids.

I'm fairly certain the black one is a roo because his comb came in reddder and faster than the other. They're both coming up on 10-11 weeks old roughly.

Thoughts?

Hi everyone, I have a two years old brown mix who developed diarrhoea for several weeks but seems fine so we just monitored.

Then suddenly several days ago she went down quite badly, with the penguin pose, infected wounds near the vent and lethargy. I washed the wound and giving her oral antibiotics.

My question is does it look like she has balloon belly at this stage? It feels warm and tight to touch.
Should I drain the belly with a syringe?

Thanks.

They're faverolles btw ☺️

The colour variation between these two is so cute - and they're completely unrelated

Left - Andrea

Right - Coco

Long post: I noticed earlier today that one of my chickens was acting a bit sleepy, she still was out foraging here & there but then i noticed she went into roost early. I went to check on her and she ate a few worms from my hand.
I brought her out trying to get her to eat more worms as it’s been raining the last few days and i figured she must have not eaten much. They do have feed in their coop, but they free range and stay outside most of the day and take shelter under our deck rather than going back to the coop when it rains.
She was enthusiastic at first about eating more worms outside the coop but then she had this strange wet green poop that i’ve never seen. She went back in shortly after.
Everything feels soft and squishy all over her body, vent is pink and clean, and i am not hearing any respiratory sounds. Her crop does feel empty though.
For some background, she is a new chicken to my flock, she came with 2 other hens about 2 months ago. They were in quarantine for roughly a month and she went into our main coop first, a month ago now.
I have noticed the pecking order sorting itself out more recently since the hens she came with have been introduced into the main flock. She sticks to them like glue even though they bully her.
She actually had to be separated from them during quarantine as they were bullying her to the point of pulling feathers and causing her to bleed around the face.
At this point, what could this be? are they preventing her from eating enough? could she be sick?
I plan to separate her from the flock tomorrow morning if she is still behaving oddly.

Here's the final penthouse setup after a lot of fussing and digging around the shed for supplies (I inherited all the animals and equipment when I bought this place). I hope she can rest and relax now. Can't tell you how nervous I was to find her dead this morning. But all is well. I gave her a good exam, best as I know how, found one little spot here that might be an injury but it just looks like kind of a scab? Couldn't see any blood or any missing feathers anywhere else. I tried putting her friend in with her but the friend seemed really anxious about the situation, sticking her head through the bars and pacing so I put her back in the run with the others. Hopefully that's the best decision. Neil didn't look like she needed the anxious pacing. Thanks again to everyone who talked me off the ledge last night!