We have a bully: a chook bully that goes around ripping feathers from the breasts of some of her sisters. We know this to be the case because Farmer Wan recently caught her in the act. Unfortunately, he was doing something else at the time and wasn't able to stop her. Now he can't identify her. I have my suspicions but can't be sure unless I catch her at it again.

This behaviour, known as "feather pecking" is dangerous for the victims. Chooks will peck at anything coloured red, including tiny blood spots advertising the vacant real estate where feathers once lived. The more the wound bleeds, the more they'll peck at it.

Chooks are cannabalistic by nature. 'Nuff said.

Feather pecking, according to that repository of all knowledge, Wikipedia, is a behavioural disorder common in birds reared for egg production, especially if they free-range (caged birds either don't have the room or have their beaks trimmed). The behaviour is transferable -- once one bird starts doing it, others will follow -- so naturally we want to nip it in the bud, especially as we've recently bought two 10-week-old pullets that we'll add to the flock once they start laying.

The best way to protect the three birds who are worst affected would be to remove them from the flock until their feathers have re-grown. We can't do this because there's nowhere else to put them -- we've already got the two pullets housed separately and two broody chooks sitting on eggs in two other houses. 

Chook tattooing, anyone?
The next best solution is to disguise the bare skin by staining it darker. Most of our chooks are Brown Shavers, so their pink skin contrasts strongly with their brown plumage. We tried an iodine-based spray, which just stained the skin a darker shade of pink. Then we read on an American website about stuff called Blu-Kote. It's germicidal, fungicidal and the active ingredient is gentian violet (anyone of my vintage might remember having it painted on their skin for childhood chicken pox lesions -- it bloody hurt). Gentian violet definitely stains anything it comes into contact with, so we thought we might give it a try.

The product isn't available in NZ. Our vet had something similar but it was prescription-only medication and would involve driving a balding chook nearly 100km in to the surgery for a consultation, and then paying a lot of money. Anyone who takes a chook to the vet becomes a laughing stock around here (we know because we did it once, back in the very early days), so we decided it would be easier and cheaper to order the stuff online.

When it arrived, Farmer Wan read out the warnings, including this one:

I'm loath to turn our baldy chooks toxic and the jury seems to be out on how this stuff affects eggs, so I've decided to try a food colouring-based alternative first and see how effective it is. The Blu-Kote is there only as a last resort.

Minimising risk factors
We're also trying to control some of the factors that seem to make chooks more prone to feather pecking by:
1. Ensuring the hen houses are clean and air quality inside them is good
2. Adding extra protein (blood and bone) to their food
3. They already have plenty of room to roam around in, so there's not much more we can do about that
4. Giving them a big, beautiful toy to play with, namely:

We were told his name was Lucky (possibly because he avoided the Christmas roasting dish by being bought by us) but I promptly changed it to Rocky, purely so that I can greet him like this:

He hasn't stopped the feather pecking but the hens adore him and I've noticed the three worst affected girls snuggle up next to him at night, so maybe he's doing some good. I've also noticed that a couple of other chooks are sporting brand new bald patches as a result of Rocky's amorous attentions. Have you ever seen a rooster mount a hen? It's brutal but at least we'll have plenty of fertile eggs to shove under the broodies.

Young Rocky, having now settled in quite nicely, crows lustily whenever he feels like it. This then sets off our little bantam rooster. They yodel back and forth at each other until the bantam starts sneezing. This can be hilarious or a total pain, depending on whether it's three in the afternoon or five in the morning.

So now our poultry numbers total eighteen: 11 Brown Shaver hens, two Brown Shaver pullets, a Pekin bantam hen and rooster, Rocky the Light Sussex rooster and two very special girls I call the Oooh La Las (they're a story for another day). Our enslavement is complete.

I'll let you know how the blue girls go.

Posted by Farmer Nik

Happy New Year! 2013 was a cracker of a year at Muntanui and we're hoping this one will be even better. I think it will be -- if we're able to overcome our biggest challenge yet. 

In 2014, the last of our savings will run out. Without that financial backstop, we're facing the very real prospect of being broke. Impecunious. Fiscally challenged. Impoverished. Indigent. Penniless. Insolvent. Poor.

A little scary, I'll admit.

It's easy to play around at farming and being sustainable when you know that if it all goes belly-up, you're covered. Sell a few eggs here, flog off a couple of plants there, make your own bread from scratch and feel virtuous and proud that you're living the dream.

And we are living our dream, no doubt about that. We're as happy as tiger worms in a bathtub full of additive-free cow shit. We just have to work out how to make it pay more. So, before our impending penury forces Farmer Wan to do anything desperate (like this or this), we'll get creative. We'll ruthlessly cut our expenses (all future visitors to Muntanui: please bring alcohol and lots of it), we'll barter and we'll make the most of hitherto-unexploited opportunities. We've put together a couple of cunning plans and we'll share them with you, in good time.

Meanwhile, here are some pretty pictures taken around the garden in early December, back before it started raining and didn't stop.

Posted by Farmer Nik