Thank you to Sam and Raymond for more Kale for our chickens over the weekend!
Boots and his flock got to enjoy theirs in the sun!
Check out Boots offering a piece to Bubbles at the end! 🩷🩷🩷
Our main flock enjoying the golden afternoon sunshine over the weekend!
This is what Free Ranging is all about!
Big Thankyou to a lovely person from the allotment for all of the fantastic greens this week! All chickens and quail have LOVED them!
Trying to clean out our main chicken flock is tough when they want to crowd around you to say hello!
Such friendly birds - rescue chickens just love the attention!
When you're trying to sort your feathers and someone turns up and takes over .. 🤣🤣
Sorry Loki and Hetti!
Our Star Wars Flock is a little unconventional in that we have / have had Bantams, Rhode Island Red, Polish, Lohmann Brown breeds all living in harmony together!
They are where a hen being severely picked on in the main flock moves to and is always accepted by the group.
It's where a lone hen that comes to us as a rehome goes and is made part of the gang in minutes.
It's also where the chicks have previously gone when rejected by their mum who tried to peck their heads to dispose of them! And Leia plus one of the Polish girls both took over a their mummas to provide safety, food and warmth as they grew 🥰
We have two cockerels in this flock - brothers - although being family doesn't usually stop cockerels fighting! This flock is just happy to be happy and not looking for trouble!
Enjoy free ranging guys!
Jobs that Cockerels have - number 1!
Cockerels are gentlemen! They search for any available food and call their flock to it!
This can be grass, worms, bugs, treats we give them in their run etc.
We can copy the sound and they come to us too!
Our cockerels - Boots, Stan Lee, L'il Man and OBE Wan (Kanobi) - all call their girls over for food before they eat anything themselves which is just wonderful to watch!
(This is Obe Wan with L'il Man in the background!)
🦆 More ducks but it's totally worth it! 🦆
Queenie is our female Crested Duck and as you can see she absolutely knows how to show off her pompom on her head!
The crest on a crested duck is actually a deformity!!! It's caused when the skull doesn't close properly when a duckling is developing and can mean a crested duck has neurological issues or a shorter lifespan.
Queenie here has never shown any signs of difficulties or even illnes and is now 3 1/2 years old x
Have you seen a crested duck in real life before?
Despite having a proper duck pond, most of our rescues and rehomes prefer the smaller pools!
Commercial Ducks don't have access to water to actually get into they just have water they can drink and dunk their face in to clean their nares (nostrils) so it's not uncommon for rescue ducks to not naturally go into a duck pond to swim, clean, play etc.
Personally I think they are playing a duck version of the game 'sardines' 🤣🤣🤣
Loki Duck enjoying his version of a Duckie Jacuzzi 🤣🤣🤣
Part of the daily pet enclosure checks this time of year include de-icing things!
The ducks' ramps into the ponds freeze over where the ducks flap about and send water everywhere but it then means some of the older or heavier ducks, like the French Star Ducks, can't get out of the pond as they slip back down.
Although ducks can be in freezing cold water and swim about happily if they keep trying to get out they become exhausted and can drown 😲
So I'm scraping the ramps clean twice a day to keep them all safe! And I have Loki to help me too!!
Today I was helped by Matilda the Rescue Hen - I love how she chats!
Part of looking after our Chickens, Quail and Ducks over winter is checking everyone has access to water! Our ferrets have a heated water bowl as their enclosure is next to our workshop with power.
Water bowls freeze solid
Waterer systems freeze in the tubes
Duck pond ramps freeze so they can't get out easily
Water the ducks splash freezes and can cause problems for their feet
Hose pipes freeze so there's no instant access to fresh water!
But we have watering cans, water jugs and ways of breaking ice or scraping the ice off the ground and the ramps to keep everyone happy and safe!!
Plus we get to spend even more time with our pets while we are helping them!!
Ducks say 'meh' to the snow
Sometimes our rescue hens come with unusual beaks; misshaped, broken pieces, half missing, overgrown on one side etc
While they can manage with these differences it does take some managing such as deep bowls so they can put their beak right in to pick up the food properly and deeper water bowls for the same reason.
Beaks can regrown but it's slow going and if they have had a traumatic start, eg being bullied or poor health, then the beak may never grow back fully.
Sometimes we can clip the excess off a beak to make a hen more comfortable and other times like here we just keep an eye on them and ensure they are eating and drinking x
Our 'Star Wars' flock of chickens got a new coop at the weekend!
Given away free via Facebook Marketplace (yay!) it gives them a nice area with plenty of ventilation, I can open the windows during the day to give them more places to perch and they have the roof as well if they want to be somewhere high up during the day!
This is their first night - these last few going in we're waiting where their old coop door used to be until the others called them!
We take play houses, storage bins, wooden crates ... homesteading rules apy on this small holding and we recycle and reuse everything we possibly can!
Behind the scenes running a small animal sanctuary: Main Chicken run daily cleaning
