RIP Violet Dorking

I WAS hoping to post nice stuff about my 4 new POL pullets today, but I have sadder news.

I went out last night to lock in the girls and I couldn't find Violet Dorking. I looked all over the hen paddock...and found her dead under the conifer where the girls have their dust baths.

On checking her over this morning, she seems to have died of a broken neck.

She was being bullied by EVERYONE Tuesday morning and I spent a fair bit of time trying to sort it all out and put her back inside Cluckingham Palace for safely, but she was too frightened and wouldn't let me. She went and hid in the branches of the conifer instead, which was a safe place for her to be so I left her to hide there.

A jet flew over late afternoon, I looked out of the window to check all the girls were out and OK and saw her then, but I was busy in the kitchen so didn't go out to see them. I am assuming that she was panicked at some point later on and ran for cover, hitting her neck in the process.

We hatched her out under Sweetiepie our Maran hen, just a year ago:-( and we have watched her grow up. She was a lovely, friendly hen, a rare breed Silver Dorking and with very funny little ways - like most Dorkings she would go broody at the drop of an egg, but she would also follow me around crooning at me and would jump up on my lap given half a chance.

Still, at least I know she died very quickly.

Violet, I shall miss you a lot... :-(



Violet just hatched out



With her sisters and Sweetiepie



Taking a ride on mum.



laying her first egg...

Stopping a very broody hen!

As I previously mentioned , Violet Dorking had gome madly broody...dunking her bum in icy water didn't help, and she was severely disrupting the other Dorking girls in their life and egg laying...so she had a 2 day spell in the "anti hormonal hen" pen....aka a double insulated plastic rabbit hutch, with no bedding, but lots of water and food...

She REALLY did NOT like this and screetched like a mad hen non stop for a few hours, then settled down to a low key grumble for another few hours...and then stopped being broody.

I let her out after 24 hours and she is back to normal, laying and free ranging and being her usual delightful self.

So...as Sweetiepie is also mad broody hen, guess who is in the "anti hormonal hen pen" now?

Quiet reigns in the orchard, at last ;-)

A hormonal Violet Dorking hen

Violet Dorking has gone VERY broody in the last week :-(

She sits all day in the Eglu nest box and is very vocal and aggressive if you try to feel for eggs under her or move her off the nest....and if you DO move her she squats down and "nests" wherever she is....



I have dunked her bum in a bucket of icy water , to try to "snap" her out of being broody..I did this 3 times in the space of one day...but she is STILL broody.

I don't want her to hatch out chicks at the moment as I don't want any more young ones just now, also I have not yet organised the houses for any more chickens or where I will pen them in to be safe and have lots of space and NOT trash my garden!

I plan on putting the chickens out in a big pen in the wood, but not just NOW!

And I don't like the possible option of putting her on fake eggs and letting her sit on them. I don't really want to put her through that for no return of chicks to rear AND she will not lay eggs for a long time.

hm mm will have to put her in a wire bottomed broody pen next, I think!

This cools her "nether regions" down due to the air circulating around...and she has no access to nesting material so it helps to stop the brooding instinct..

She will still have food and water and shelter...just not be able to make a nest and brood in it.

Poor hormonal Violet hen! She only started laying 6 weeks ago so is a classic hormonal teenager....I DO feel sorry for her but I cannot afford to just leave her be as she is disrupting all the other Dorking girls, who also want to lay and sleep in the Eglu...

Sometimes I feel a bit too emotionally involved with my hens...(!) but I am their surrogate mum and *I* have to decide what is best for them all..

Gosh it is like being a parent to 12 teenages at the moment I suspect! ( probably not really but you get the gist of what I mean! ;-)