What started as a single mom's simple desire for her kids to be away from the city and to be surrounded by more trees has turned into the drive to have a more self sufficient life-style
Clyde took a turn for the worst last night and didn't stand up on his own a single time. Even when we got him out of the crate to give him his medicine, he wasn't opening his eyes for very long.
This morning, his comb was nearly all black and he would only open one eye briefly. His breathing was very labored and I knew he wasn't going to last very much longer. Johnathon went outside to check on him and watched him take list last few breaths.
It was devastating and has taken a major toll on both of us. I started to dig a grave for him but quickly realized I wouldn't be able to bury him the same way we had buried the other birds. I found a place that would cremate him and we will be picking up his ashes in a wood box this weekend.
Clyde was an amazing bird and definitely was a very influential part of our family learning that chickens were more than just egg producers. His personality was a delight to see each day from the way that he would call his girls over to get treats he had found to the way that he came running to us each time that we came outside.
He is missed and will be missed every day both by the oldest son and I, as well as his girls.
These pictures are in order from when we first got him at about 3 months old to the last picture we have of him when he was healthy. I'm choosing to leave the pictures of him in his weakened state out of this post as that isn't how he deserves to be remembered. He was a tough bird and a fierce protector of his girls, but was an amazing friend to my oldest son.
It's been a rough week and I rushed home tonight to finish canning the tomatoes. There were about 50 pounds left. The boys helped to peel them and get the seeds out and then I got to work.
I made a bunch of jars of stewed diced tomatoes, 3 jars of tomato paste, and then started another huge pot of spaghetti sauce following a different recipe.
Tomato paste
3 small jars of the tomato paste
A bunch of jars of stewed tomatoes
I'm hoping that Friday morning I can can the spaghetti sauce that is cooking now and then will be able to take a break from canning until we get into apples.
Silkie Sue lead her chicks outside today. We found them about 100 feet away from the coops.
They're small enough to slip through the fence
Thirsty little boogers
They weren't able to follow Silkie Sue back into the coop because it's too high, so after she went in and they wouldn't follow her, she came back out and nestled down with them in the corner of the chicken run. We had to spend some time catching them to get them all back into the coop.
And now for a cute video of chicks learning to find bugs....
As we were walking into the house this evening, the oldest said he saw a guinea egg on the path to the neighbor's house. I told him to go get it and started heading in. He called me back and said there were several eggs there.
Sorry for the choppy video. I haven't looked at the settings to see how I can fix that issue, but in any case, you can see the cute little chicks eating.
Clyde showed some signs of wry neck a few days ago. Wry neck is when a bird basically loses control of their neck and it twitches, jerks, and twists in strange ways. They can also end up flipping over backwards or walking backwards. The first day it was just twitching and twisting once in awhile. I followed the advice I read online and bought Vitamin E and Selenium to give him, but within two days I found him on the coop floor.
I thought he was dead and immediately started screaming for the oldest to come outside. I finally saw him move slightly and when we went into the coop to get him I realized that he was on the ground with his head twisted backward and on the floor.
I held him while the oldest ran to the neighbors to borrow a large crate to put him in. He ate and drank what we gave him but it was clear he had no real control over his own body.
The next morning I called a vet and made an appointment to take him and BigRed in. After work I raced home with the boys, wrapped the birds up in towels, handed one to each boy, and turned around to head back to town.
(I will skip the part of the story where I blew a tire and had to call someone to come get us and take us the rest of the way. No, I'm not kidding.)
The youngest and BigRed
The oldest and Clyde
The vet visit was almost two hours long.
The vet said that chicken feed often has particles of metal in them, and if a chicken digests it, they can have issues like these. He said it could be another issue too. He offered to do an x-ray to see if there was metal, or start antibiotics and see how things went, or put him to sleep.
Clyde had lost a bit of weight and was only 6 pounds, but was alert and eating with a little help and these were good signs.
I turned to the oldest and asked him what he wanted to do. We'd already talked about he would be paying the vet bill since this was his chicken (even though I didn't really plan on making him pay the whole thing.) He said he wanted to use his first paycheck to pay for the x-ray, so they took Clyde back.
Not a good picture, but there was metal in there
There was indeed a piece of metal in his stomach. They said if we follow the treatment, the prognosis was fairly good. He has to get a shot of medicine twice a day, take a half of a large pill twice a day, and get an oral medication twice a day. Basically the three medicines would help the metal work it's way out of him and he would be on antibiotics to keep him healthy until he was cleared again.
BigRed is a bigger concern in terms of her prognosis. The vet thinks that a follicle from an egg was basically lost inside her body and her body was reacting to it by building up a lot of fluid. She also was a little underweight, but was 7 pounds (a pound heavier than Clyde, probably because of the fluid.) He said he could put her to sleep or we could try some medicine to see if that improved anything. Her medicine is a half of a pill and some oral medication that is a mix of antibiotics and pain killers in the hopes that the fluid will decrease and she'll get back to normal. He said she only had a 50/50 chance of getting better and he wanted to see her again in two weeks to see if there was any improvement.
Waiting for the vet is tiring
I made it very clear that I was not capable of giving anyone a shot so I made sure that the vet taught the oldest how to do it.
I paid the hefty vet bill, we wrapped the chickens back up and headed home. This morning, the oldest woke up earlier than normal so that we'd have time to give out all of the medicine. Clyde got his shot and they both got all of the oral medication before I had to leave for work. This evening we did it all over again.
So far there is no sign of improvement in either of them, but I am still hopeful since it has only been 24 hours.
I'm shocked to hear about metal being in the feed and now I'm researching what we can do to get it out, I may be investing in a big magnet to stir through the feed every day.
