Cookies were well received by recipients today. Scott did a fine job with decorating – we’ll try to post a photo later.
Tucked the hens in early tonight. Noticed one of the hens, Wyan the Wyandotte, was standing stiffly – not a normal posture. Entered coop to check on her and collect eggs. Wyan has been on the hit list for a while due to her behavior. She will frequently travel several feet out of her way to peck other hens, and contributes to disharmony in the yard. She’s just not very nice.
I captured Wyan and checked out her rear end. As I suspected from her stiff posture she has a prolapsed oviduct. We have treated a prolapsed oviduct on a hen in the past, but once it happens there is a tendency for it to recur. Treatment consists of immobilizing the hen in a quart yogurt container (with a hole for the head), warm saline rinse of the nether regions, clean up of any poop, and tucking everything back inside with a liberal dose of neosporin. The hen is then isolated and kept quiet in a bedding free cage for several days to recuperate and minimize damage if the prolapse recurs.
Anecdotal evidence suggests that feeding black sunflower seeds (high oil content) helps prevent.
Unfortunately prolapsed oviducts tend to recur, and I’m not wild about declimatizing the hen (their coop is kept near freezing – warm enough to make them comfortable but not so warm that they prefer staying in to going out) by keeping her indoors for observation.
I’ve got her quiet in a box in the garage for a few minutes, while we consider the most humane options (for her, the humans, and the other hens).
On a more pleasant note, one of the eggs tonight was a pullet egg. One of our youngest hens (6 or 8 months) has begun laying. It’s a lovely warm brown color, and about half the size of the other eggs. We haven’t named the two babies that hatched this spring. Suppose we’d better do that now that they are contributing members of society.