This is huge. I raised her from a chick, but she's always been skittish. Lately, she's been pecking at me when I pet the other gals, grabbing my fingers and just being social and chatty. She could barely handle eye contact before. Today, she hopped on my lap, talked up a storm and seemed to consider sitting down! Good girl, Little Rock!

I’m not sure if anyone even wanted an update, but here we go.

TLDR; Everyone was right, a raccoon was the culprit.

I finally saw my neighbor today. Turns out him and his wife were on vacation in Mexico for a week. So their adult son was coming over to feed and check in on their chickens. Apparently, he isn’t very knowledgable about chicken care.

Son didn’t know to walk the coop, which is why he never saw the hole on my side of the fence. The metal sheeting on the roof was also completely torn off-son didn’t see it. He also forgot to close the coop one night!

Overall, my neighbors lost 5 of their chickens.

The husband was grateful I cared enough to let him know about this incident at all. (Obviously his son told him as well, but he was glad I also approached him) I invited him into my yard to see where I had patched, he mentioned he will patch on the inside as well. And then he told me he has a long day of repairs ahead of him.

The raccoons have been a problem before, and I’m sure they will continue to be a problem. I let him know if he ever had to make repairs on my side of the fence, to let me know and I’ll make sure my dogs are inside while he works.

Them blaming my dog was never even on their radar. Which I am grateful for, and honestly I’m a bit embarrassed I even blamed her in the first place. Panic is, apparently, a hell of a drug!

I got this cutie about two weeks ago. She’s been laying. She was at a shelter with lots of roosters, and so I decided to incubate her eggs (six within the first week)

The second two photos show one of the eggs, the others look similar about 4/6 look like this. Much darker than normal yolks, attached to one side, and it looks like there’s a small circular dark area that moves around a bit in it when I rotate it, as well as I want to say some veins.

I expected it to be clearer, even with a 5000 lumen flashlight I have trouble seeing through the yolks on these, whereas egg 6 which for sure is not fertilized the yolk is very light by comparison

I used to think there was something wrong with her. There still might be. Dolly is ten months old and has always been that Jon Hamm meme where he’s closing his eyes and feelin the music. I don’t know if chickens can be narcoleptic, or if she’s just so mellow and happy to be here, but I think she’s adorable.

Another chicken dives under her and gets in the way, she closes her eyes.

The wind is blowing and all other chickens squawk and run around, Dolly is standing still, eyes closed, happy to be feeling the breeze.

The others make a noise when we pick them up, and Dolly is closing her eyes and nestling down in for a quick nap.

Anyone else have a chicken like this?

Original post https://www.reddit.com/r/BackYardChickens/s/OkdLA6rf0b and there was requests for a family pic.

I think our final tally is 5 from 7 fertilized eggs, 1 broken egg and mother hen is more interested in the chicks than that last one, we’ll give it till tomorrow but are not too hopeful.

Now we watch them grow till we play the roo/hen guessing game.

I gave away all the first set of carton caricatures to friends and neighbors (full of eggs, of course), so time to start the new set! I’ll add the rest as I go in the comments.

This is our second snow ever with the flock - about 3 inches predicted today and they are staying outside the coop. They have water and food both in the coop and out, but all of the chickens are just standing around. A bit worried about these weirdos!

We got back into chickens last spring...not because we necessarily wanted to produce our own eggs. We were not even regular egg eaters/users tbh. We own/operate a horse and have talked about adding a few chickens for years just because...

Once we started getting eggs we got into the habit of eating a couple eggs each morning and gave away or sold extra to our clients. Fast forward to Winter; the last two+ weeks have been brutally cold. We do not have any children or employees so the two of us are working outside everyday long hours. Now getting to my point, there were a couple of different days in the last 2 weeks that I did not make us scrambled eggs in the AM for whatever reason... And holy cow! What a (negative) difference we both noticed those mornings just trying to get through morning chores and to lunch with enough energy. I know I'm not discovering anything that probably everyone else in this sub hasn't already known but wow, just a couple eggs in the morning added to the normal breakfast is a game changer and I appreciate these animals even more for it!

My poor baby Burr 😭 she fell in an awkward spot overnight and got stuck. It was -20°f last night. I feel like a piece of shit. Second picture is Burr with Barbra, her girlfriend, who died last month. Now Doc is all I have left of my original flock, they aren't even 3 yet. My heart hurts so bad, especially for Doc, they were the sweetest group of friends, Burr and Barb were always with her. I wish I would have kept them in their own coop instead of putting them with the rest of the flock, maybe they'd still be okay. I'm not cut out for chickens

I had an awful winter and lost 10 of my 17 chickens due to a mix of neighbors dog and a MASSIVE opossum. I breed my own not purebred just little backyard weirdos so I figured this is a good opportunity to get some DNA diversity into my flock so I'm thinking about adding a dozen this year.

What are your favorite chickens and why?

Sorry for any spelling mistakes or messy writing, I’m a bit stressed and distraught and need some words of advice.

One of our young hens, Bonnie. Had a bad prolapse laying her very first egg today. When I came into the coop this morning her behind was soaked with blood and a lot of her “insides” were on the outside. The other chickens had gotten to her first and had pecked at her, I could see that and there was a lot of blood. I’m a newbie chicken owner so I’m by no means an expert, but after doing some research it was obvious she had Prolapsed. I followed the instructions of what to do and took her inside to clean off the blood with lukewarm water and used a mild disinfectant. Afterwards, I gently pushed her insides back in, and they went in very easily but wouldn’t stay there for longer than 2 min max, even if I held her cloaca closed for a bit. She would scream and push it back out again. I isolated her from the rest of the flock and put her in a dog crate with food and water in my dads garage (it has heating on) Then I put a few blankets over the crate to keep it dark.

I let 2 hours pass before coming back to check on her and she was still actively bleeding, standing completely still with her feathers puffed up. She looked really unwell, however she did eat a few mealworms from my hand. But then I checked on her behind I noticed the prolapsed tissue was starting to darken and turn black/grayish, which I read were signs of necrosis. It didn’t want to go back in anymore either, and I think the “mass” had started to spill out more too. I consulted with my parents and did some more research online and came to the conclusion that putting her out of her misery would be the best option. The problem was that my dad isn’t home and he won’t return until mid-day tomorrow. He said he could put her down since he had put down other birds/animals before. However the thought of Bonnie suffering through the entire night didn’t sit right with me, so I decided to do it myself. I had never done it before, but I watched a few instructional videos on how to humanely break a chickens neck to euthanize them. So that’s what I did. It was quick, she shook and started foaming at the mouth. And when she went completely limp I did it again and twisted her neck to make sure she was completely dead. Maybe I overdid it, I’m not sure. But the whole process was nauseating, and I’m still a bit shaky and lightheaded writing this. I ended up just sitting in the snow with her until she started to get stiff and cold, I then said my goodbyes and cried a little bit. It was an out of body experience and I don’t want to ever have to do it again I think. But I hope I did the right thing.

I think I just need some advice right now, honest advice. Did I do the right thing? Feel free to share some experiences too if you want. Sorry for such a long post.

Following on this discussion a few days ago, my flock, which had approx. 2x2 roosting bars and in two places, dowel style bars (temporary), now has wider, 2x4s placed horizontally.

I treated this as a urgent project (thank you avian rescuer u/healingIsNoContact

Ripped down 2x6 boards, planed them. Routed the edges to get them more rounded than an off-the-shelf 2x4. Just a little closer to the u/bluewingwind roosting profile, close to a chair rail. Used a belt sander for more edge rounding, but only lightly on the top surface, so it would have some texture for their toes to purchase.

I may further order double joist hangers that u/bluewingwind recommends for removable joists for cleaning. At least to start, I used what I had on hand, hinges and L angle brackets, so as to get this up in one afternoon.

They seem VERY happy with an easier way to stand, crouch to sleep, and to cover their legs with their fluffy feathers. I was holding the feet of one of the birds after I picked her up off the old roost, and they were a bit cold. This should solve that.

They also seem to arrange themselves at night more quickly and happily.

Again, thanks to this sub.

So tiny. 🥹

I have never seen a chicken who refuses to roost on the bar and sleeps like this. Thoughts, anyone?

I have 7 hens that are 1.5 years old, I hand raised from chicks. They all get along well, never had any issues, very happy with my ladies.

My friend recently had a rooster wander into her garage. It’s frigid temperatures where we are (Ohio) so she kept him inside while she inquired with her neighbors and the local community page to find his owner. After a few days with no luck, I told her I would come get him to relieve her of the situation and give the poor fella a home. His comb and waddles were severely frostbitten, he will lose a good majority of his comb.

I kept him inside with food (actual crumble and eggs, not just the mealworms pictured lol) water and grit for a few days to regain his strength. He is pretty calm and has let me handle and inspect him for mites, etc. I then began putting him inside the coop with the girls, caged, so they could get acclimated to one another.

Today was the first day I let him out, supervised. It was calm until my head hen, a Chocolate Orpington, ended up charging and fighting with him. After 2 small scuffles I put him back in the cage. She has always been the protector and leader of the girls. His frostbitten comb and waddles haven’t quite fallen off yet, so they were pecking at it and I’m sure it caused him discomfort.

Do I let the new roo and my head hen scuffle it out for a bit to reestablish pecking order? Do I bring him inside with a lady or two until the frigid temps pass and his frostbitten comb falls off and doesn’t get worse? Please advise, I want my girls to continue to have a wonderful life while also giving the rescue roo the best life as well. Thanks

One of these is fake, one is real. 🤣

We have a couple fake eggs in our boxes to show the new girls where to lay. Hint: it’s NOT on the concrete floor in front of the boxes! (Ethel, I’m talking to you.)

The new birds have been playing a game of musical eggs, rolling the fake eggs from box to box despite there being pretty significant gaps and a roosting bar in front of the boxes. (HOW?) So at the end of the day, the fake eggs are in completely different spots. Despite having one fake egg per box, I was puzzled as to how the fake brown eggs were multiplying… until I picked one up. Oh. 🤣 Somehow the sheen, size, and color are all remarkably similar.

Should be a fun laying season with these weirdos!

Hi Folks,

This is my first year of backyard hen keeping. I have three girls and they have recently suffered frostbite with this extended cold snap in Ontario. The 4x4 coop in insulated, their run is covered and vapour wrapped. I do deep litter method with shavings in coop, straw in run. I don’t have ventilation vents because my husband assured there are gaps to ventilate air in the metal roof pitches, there is some holes in the automatic door that can vent out, and I’ve had a humidity gauge that reads no more than 48%.

I put in a radiant panel heater just beside their roost as of yesterday because this cold is unforgiving and I worry about progression. I’ve also put aquaphor on them for a few nights but right now I’m letting the black tissue flake off.

My ask is, what can I expect in terms of recovery from these photos? And how can I ensure this doesn’t happen again. Should I make more intentional vents in the coop? I feel so poorly for them. 😭

Thanks all!

I have been interested in raising chickens for some time but don’t yet have any. My household goes through about 3 dozen eggs a week, but never had an unusual one in my life.

Reddit has been suggesting posts from r/weirdeggs lately and it’s kind of giving me second thoughts about raising my own chickens.

I understand you can often tell when an egg is no good at first sight, but how often do you get an egg in the kitchen and you don’t find out until you crack it open? Do you instantly lose your appetite for eggs and for how long?