Burnside Poultry

Much more eloquently than I could

http://burnsidepoultry.blogspot.co.uk/

A dry few days

We've had quite a lot of rain recently . The burns fill , and the pond overflows . And the noise from the burn can be heard through the house .

But when its been dry and  the burn isnt in spate its quite tranquil really

Coccidiosis - update

One improved, one worse , one much the same . A pale comb is one of the signs of a poorly hen. You can see the difference in redness between the one that is standing ( and improving) and the one that is sitting,

The one that is worse will probably die in the night.
We thought about putting the improving one back with the other 8 but decided to keep her separate
-she may still be shedding parasites. The parasites survive in damp conditions and there is a lot of mud around in the field .

Coccidiosis

As well as the ducks, we also added to our flock of Light Sussex hens .

But some are not well.One has died.
the other affected ones are lethargic, pale and with blood in the droppings.

It may be Coccidiosis . The gory details are here .
So we have separated the affected birds.
Risk factors are damp environments. And Orkney has been very very damp so far this year.
And at the moment we will wait and see.

New Arrivals

We think that in the ducks that we have hatched  we have 4 drakes and 1 hen. Not what we wanted.  I suspect we may not be having turkey for Christmas this year . ( But Christmas Dinner is messed up because of the Christmas Day Ba ) and probably wont happen on Christmas Day.

Khaki Campbells

We thought we had better increase our stock and add some diversity , so we bought some Khaki Campbell  ducks and some Indian Runners. We have had problems keeping up with the demand for eggs  and Indian Runners are prolific layers and may keep going into the winter.  
So we had some delivered off the ferry from Aberdeen. This involved going to meet the ferry  at 11pm. Hanging around whilst they unloaded everything, picking  your animals out a  crate , taking them home and settling them in . So all finished shortly after 1 am .



And to stop the other ducks going after them we have penned both lots .

When the new ones are bit bigger and able to stand up for themselves

Indian Runners

And this lot of ducks are as stupid as the ones we already have.

q. Which is more intelligent, a duck or a root vegetable ?
A. A carrot

The Orkney Onion Eater

The onions have been got at again . Last year I thought it was the geese

But this year I netted the beds were stuff was growing . One corner of the netting over the onion bed came adrift and something must have got in .  The gap wasnt big enough for geese - so i think it must have been hare.

A few have been spared

I'll have to be a bit more meticulous about the netting next year

Limpy the chick - Update

There was a concern that the limping chick  might have Mareks Disease .
if so , that would have been bad news - its a virus that kills young poultry and could have effectively wiped out most of the flock.
But we have been watching him and the limp hasnt been getting worse  and he, or any of the others, haven't developed any of te other signs of infection .
We couldnt see any problem when we looked at his foot.
So we think it must just have been that he got trampled on , or got his foot stuck in  something

Anyway , limpy the chick is improving

Limpy the Chick

The first lot of chicks, born a few weeks ago , over a couple of days  are still in a run  to protect them from predators















But one of them  has developed a limp - hence limpy the chick. 

 

weve left him in with the hen and the others - he gets trampled on from time to time, but looks like he can still get about to feed, so we shall wait and see what happens.

there isnt much we can do to improve his chances , so he stays where he is .