Saturday 20 March 2010

Ugly Betty bites the bullet

Both the new black chickens had started laying, Black Betty first, Ugly laid her first the other day, when I say lay I use the term loosely, she was wondering around with it half hanging out of her vent, I helped it out, it wasn't a properly formed egg, which is not unusual for the first couple, however, she had also managed to prolapse her vent in the process. On closer inspection and some chin rubbing we decided to give her some time to recover. She did. I did some research meanwhilst on the internet and although not common it can happen that chickens vents prolapse. You can manage it by separating them to prevent caniballism (which would eventually lead to death), pushing the prolapse back in and restrict their diet to prevent them from laying, all of that takes space, time and knowledge. Time I have, the other two I don't. I arrived at the coop this morning to discover that she had laid another perfect egg but with another not perfect egg attached to it, her prolapse was even worse and she wasn't eating.

It's an awful day when you have to make the decision to cull livestock and I know I wouldn't be human to dislike it immensely. Sorry Betty

No comments: