Nutmeg - defies the path lab with her lumps

First I took Nutmeg to my local vet who prescribed Tylan (antibiotic) as I expected. When this had no effect, we then added metacam (anti-inflamatory) but still no change. I decided I would have to seek out a poultry specialist and went to The Scott Veterinary Clinic who have a nice vet, Natalie, who specialises in exotic animals. I hadn't realised that chickens were classed as exotic but its rather nice.

She had a good feel and observed that some of the lumps were quite fleshy. She didn't think it was respiratory - so she took samples from each of the four lumps and sent them to the path lab.

Took longer than expected to get back to me because the path lab were so stumped they did the tests twice. There is "reactive lymphocites" in each of the four samples, but different ones. We discussed at length, but I decided that since Nutmeg is very happy in herself - she is even still laying eggs occasionally, and since she is already nearly 6 which is a good age for a chicken, I'm going to leave her and see how things go. If she deteriorates fast (as may happen) and is in distress I'll take her to be put to sleep. If she dies overnight, which may also happen, I've also promised to take her corpse along because the vet and the path lab are really keen to do a post-mortem to find out what this mysterious problem is.

Of course she could just recover :)

You never know.

Nutmeg - still no change

Phoned the Vet friday as no change in Nutmeg (other than a slightly runny bottom which is probably due to the antibiotic). The vet had spoken to her vet pal who was a poultry specialist in Nottingham who said she used Aivlosin and also that Metacam (anti-inflammatory) might help.

I'm getting concerned that in addition to the bulging face, Nutmeg has a distinct lump on the top left of her head and also down on the left side of her neck.

I'm now giving 3 more days Tylan plus metacam. So far (day 2) there has still been no change. May need to research Aivlosin.

Nutmeg's swollen face worsens

Really quite worried about Nutmeg. Her face is swollen on both sides, but unevenly. There seems to be a bump on top of her head, to her left side and she also appears to have a slight bump on the left side of her neck (from her perspective, if looking at her front on it is to the right).

I took her to the vet on Friday 7th. I don't have a poultry specialist vet and my vet practice had just, this week, been taken over by a new couple of vets. What the vet said matched what I'd read. Poss Myco and prescribed Tylan.

However today is day 4 and still no improvement. What could it be?

Excuse for more chicken pics 😊

I love letting my chickens out at the weekend as I clean their runs. I've been experimenting with different groupings since I still don't dare leave my newbies with Maud Nutmeg and Amber in case they do them damage since they are even tinier than my beautiful Wyandottes. So I just let them wreck my garden, awe bless

Spot 9 chickens 😃🐔🐔🐔🐔🐔🐔🐔🐔🐔

Washing my chicken

I decided today to wash my white Silkie. When I collected them, the garden they lived in had got really muddy and as the two Silkies had the run of the garden, they were already quite grubby. I knew I'd need to wash them and had read up a bit on it. It is really important to blow dry them especially if, as now, it is cold and wintery.

Chicken Washing Station

So, I prepared everything in advance. I put a little bit of soapy water in the kitchen sink, cleared the draining board and prepared an additional bowl of clear warm water for rincing. I also got the chicken towel ready.


First I stood Lulu on the draining board and tried to sponge the mud off her head. It worked to some extent but the feathers still looked brown. I then tried using a toothbrush (as advised) to clean her legs. The toothbrush worked really well at getting mud off the feathers. I stood her in the bowl of water and she didn't care for that very much and flapped a bit. I took her out and decided to lay her on her back so I could wash around the vent, feet and tail which were all very grubby.

Having laid her on her back with her head under my left arm, she seemed fairly calm although I could see her breathing was fairly fast. I gently washed away at the mud and poop stuck to her feathers. The toothbrush (soft) helped quite a bit here especially with the lumps. However once wet, the feathers still looked brown. I think I could probably have cleaned them up better with more soap, but I didn't want to get her too wet as I wasn't sure how easy it would be to dry her with the hair drier.

Chicken drying station

Having done as much as I could to her under carriage, I then stood her up and worked a little on her beard, under her chin. I had another go at her head and noticed that the feathers were quite cold. Her damp head had cooled off whilst I was working on her underneath so I decided now was the time to dry her off.

I wrapped her carefully in the towel and carried her to the dining room where I had positioned a spare dry towel, hairdryer and small cardboard box to stand her in if necessary. I had ended up standing her on the towel on the draining board so it had become quite wet in parts, although it was a large towel and much of it was still dry.

I sat on the chair with her wrapped in the dry towel on my lap and put my hand across her beak to protect her eyes and started blow drying her head. She didn't seem to mind particularly, and I could be sure not to over heat the feathers because my hand was in the air stream.

Looking pretty for the camera

I then lay her on her back to dry her underside, legs, vent and tail. This took ages (about 20 minutes maybe, I wasn't timing it). As the feathers dried off, they fluffed up beautifully by themselves. I didn't use a comb or a brush on them as I wasn't sure that you should with feathers. I moved the air around, stopping periodically to check with my hand whether the feathers were drying.

When wet, the feathers look like little sticks. As they dry, the ends fluff out like a dandelion and if feather is fairly clean, ultimately the whole feather is fluffy. There were still some that I'd not cleaned properly that never fluffed up, particularly the feed feathers. However they all still looked much better than before.

Next time I'll be more confident and wash her more thoroughly. Still, I'm pleased with my first attempt.

My Christmas Wormery

For Christmas I received a huge present, sneakily smuggled in behind the Christmas tree without me noticing!

It took a while to unwrap, and as I did, I couldn't see what it could be, although the photographer could by the time I'd removed most of the wrapping paper

Finally revealed. My new Wormery.

I ordered the worms which arrived through the post on 10 th January. It looked as though they had been trying to chew their way out.

I followed the instructions carefully. Mindful that worms don't act so fast in low temperatures, I located the Wormery in its insulating jacket in the garage with a remote temperature gauge to check. The temp has regularly dropped below 8C but not below freezing. Nevertheless I was not surprised after a week to see that they hadn't processed the small amount of household waste. They had made a start, and at least they had stopped crawling up the sides of the bin to explore their new home.

I'll leave it another week before giving them a little more food. They are at least moving the soil around and seem happy enough, though how do you tell if a worm is happy? 

It has been pointed out to me that I need to keep my chickens and worms well apart :)

First week in my garden

Lulu, Velvet and Lyra settled in well together. Lyra was a little pecked and scared the first day but they soon settled in together. Very keen to get out of the run, and very tame. Indeed lulu seems to positively want to be picked up and cuddled, as does Lyra. I have decided to work on handling all my chickens m ore so they are all this friendly. When they have muddy feet in winter it is easy not to bother. Lulu needs a bit of a wash as she has dipped her head in the water I think then got it grubby. Washing them will be an interesting experience.

Here are today's photos as they roamed the garden whilst I cleaned their runs.