Chicken Antics and Ailments

 After publishing the last post, Henrietta not so kindly reminded me she is not two years old, but is three. 

I stand corrected.

A couple of days after I refreshed one of the nesting boxes with new shavings, the little devil sat there and carefully plucked pieces of shavings out and threw them over her shoulder to the ground.  Now that's a new one around here.  Leave it to Henrie!

 
Pippi is getting big, matching the other girls in size.  But her bravado does not match her size. 

And now for the bad news.
Clara is sick and I've tried all the tricks in my bag.  I've wormed her, re-established  ACV in one of the waterers, put DE in the feed, given her an epsom salt soak, dusted DE under her wings for mites, and most recently given her three doses of colloidal silver (anti-bacterial).  This last trick came from the moderator of a local chicken group who has had chickens for 30 years.  Nothing seems to have an effect.
She's lethargic, moves slowly and rests while the other girls are frolicking during free range time.
But her comb is a nice bright red.
Louise -- any ideas?
I'm stumped.

. And to make matters worse, we're going on a mini-vacation and I'm leaving Clara in the hands of the housesitter.  A wonderful housesitter, but...

Spotlight on Henrietta

 At this point in our little flock, Henrietta is top dog when it comes to seniority -- at only two years of age.

She was a three month old when she came home to live with us from the local feed store.

I would have said she was the biggest bully in the group but seeing the others interact with Pippi, I'm not sure.

I do know she is the first to ask for breakfast in the morning.  While I clean up donkey poo, the girls get to free range for a bit and Henrie is always the first to return to the coop and stand at the feeder, waiting.  If I'm in the middle of other chores in the coop, I bow to her request and get breakfast served up pronto.

I think she knows her name, although I'm more sure Sharone and Pippi know theirs.

 Henrietta fooling around in the hay aisle

Last month I found  6 eggs tucked away in a nicely made straw nest in the hay aisle.  Although not Henrie's handiwork, she felt compelled to join the trend.

Here's a quick clip to show off Pippi's gorgeous coloring.
By the way, she is turning into a little ankle nipper and I'm not sure how to cure her of this.  It hurts!

On a final note, the donkeys leisurely stroll to breakfast, as we all should, I guess.  

We've Moved To Blogger? and a brief Pippi update

 I'm keeping this short.

It's been two weeks since I posted and in that time, Blogpost (the hosting site I used) morphed into Blogger.  I tried repeated to access the blog and finally today I think I'm in.  I think.

I'll post just a smidge and your job is to tell me if it's public/available/accessible.

The big news is Pippi was integrated into the flock last Saturday evening when everyone was in bed and settled for the night.  I simply opened the yellow door separating the two coop areas.  There have been scuffles - the only non-bullies are Sharone (in fact one of his jobs is to break up squabbles) and Clara.  It's slow but progress is being made.  She doesn't skitter away every time one of the big girls looks at her (a slight exaggeration).  And in fact they have roosted together, although not every night.

Pips is the only one sitting, 2nd from left

In order l-r: Clara, Pippi, Storm, Sharone

I'm going to leave it at that for the moment, EXCEPT to say Miss Pippi has turned into a helamonster for Grubblies (Grubblies are oven-dried black soldier fly grubs),  Like mealworms, but not.  In the morning she is literally under my feet for every step and pecking at my shoes until she gets her treats.  She is a bit obsessed.