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Hi all,
I need to work out if I have been misled.
Let me correct that - I know damn well I have been misled - I just need to work out how thoroughly!
You must all be bored with the saga of my hens, however....
Hazel, clever girl, spotted that we had red mite in the big henhouse at the weekend. I duly cleaned, scrubbed and cleaned again, dusted everything in sight with the appropriate nostrum and then took thought to Kiev.
This morning was the first chance I have had to do the full works on the little ark (since she was hurriedly put back in it a week ago) and when I grabbed her to dust her I noticed she has a heck of a lot of feathers in pin. That is I assume they are in pin, there is a feather sheath and the soft end of a feather poking out of it. I had noticed one or two when I rescued her, and I had noticed that she seemed to have a lot developing around her head as the week wore on, but I just thought that this would be her poll and muffles, not that it would be general all over her.
When I got her on 10th May I was told that she was 4 to 4.5 months old - which I converted to 17-19 weeks and since my books say that POL is reached between 18 and 24 weeks I gave it no thought. That was nearly 5 weeks ago and so she is now supposedly between 22 and 24 weeks old. I am not convinced that any of the eggs that I thought were hers, were hers. I now believe that they were early attempts from Kentucky, so I have yet to see an egg from her.
Should a bird of 22-24 weeks have a fifth of her feathers in pin?
Is this more likely to be the case if she is in fact a he? I wouldn't say she crows, but she makes quite a racket at 7am each morning!
Was she in fact a heck of a lot younger than I was told?
And given that, will she have been harmed by having been on layers pellet for the last 5 weeks, not growers pellet?
In fact, just how badly have I been misled?
Oh yes, one last question. If she is in fact a he, would that explain why Blackie went nuts?
Terry
I need to work out if I have been misled.
Let me correct that - I know damn well I have been misled - I just need to work out how thoroughly!
You must all be bored with the saga of my hens, however....
Hazel, clever girl, spotted that we had red mite in the big henhouse at the weekend. I duly cleaned, scrubbed and cleaned again, dusted everything in sight with the appropriate nostrum and then took thought to Kiev.
This morning was the first chance I have had to do the full works on the little ark (since she was hurriedly put back in it a week ago) and when I grabbed her to dust her I noticed she has a heck of a lot of feathers in pin. That is I assume they are in pin, there is a feather sheath and the soft end of a feather poking out of it. I had noticed one or two when I rescued her, and I had noticed that she seemed to have a lot developing around her head as the week wore on, but I just thought that this would be her poll and muffles, not that it would be general all over her.
When I got her on 10th May I was told that she was 4 to 4.5 months old - which I converted to 17-19 weeks and since my books say that POL is reached between 18 and 24 weeks I gave it no thought. That was nearly 5 weeks ago and so she is now supposedly between 22 and 24 weeks old. I am not convinced that any of the eggs that I thought were hers, were hers. I now believe that they were early attempts from Kentucky, so I have yet to see an egg from her.
Should a bird of 22-24 weeks have a fifth of her feathers in pin?
Is this more likely to be the case if she is in fact a he? I wouldn't say she crows, but she makes quite a racket at 7am each morning!
Was she in fact a heck of a lot younger than I was told?
And given that, will she have been harmed by having been on layers pellet for the last 5 weeks, not growers pellet?
In fact, just how badly have I been misled?
Oh yes, one last question. If she is in fact a he, would that explain why Blackie went nuts?
Terry
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