(no subject)

Awww, poor Salula got beat up... I feel I bad, all the birds were being nice to her for the last few weeks, and now suddenly this evening I found her in the corner with her face all swollen and eyelids messed-up. ;; It looks so painful. I hope she'll pull through this, she's been on a downhill decline health-wise for a long time, but on the other hand she's a tough old bird and has survived a lot. I cleaned off her face and disinfected it, unfortunately the eyelids are pretty bad and I can't do much for them. Just gotta wait for the swelling to go down, I guess. I may give her some aspirin if I can scrape off a tiny enough amount for just one bird. For those who don't who The Salula is, she's my wonderful crazy white chicken who I've had for twelve or thirteen years now. She mothers anything and everything and she's just a total sweetheart, albeit odd. She's legendary among my friends and I. I love her so much and will miss her terribly whenever she dies, but I also know she's had a long and mostly very happy life.

I never wrote about it, but Pen-Pen (the now sort of adolescent duckling) is having some health issues, too. Namely, for some reason his neck is twisted off to the side at a weird angle for some unknown reason. I have him in the backyard and he's getting vitamin enriched water and Tetracycline daily in hopes that it'll help. If the issue doesn't start to get better within a another five days of Tetracycline, I'm going to take him to the vet because it's a concerning issue. He's not having many other symptoms and does not seem to be in any pain or even discomfort, but twisting neck = spine issue = a definite concern, especially because it does seem to be progressively getting worse. It's possible it could be chlamydia psitacci, which is what his dad Tux had (and I'm kinda hoping this is what it is because I know how to treat that) but it's hard to say for sure.

Thankfully all other poultry are doing excellent! My four serama chicks in my room are getting bigger (and appear to be three hens and a rooster though nothing is guaranteed at this age), Eugenie and her young duckling are doing great, the quail are all outside and happy as can be, Splash and Charming are sitting on eight growing eggs so I should have more serama chicks at some point, and I have a whole pile of chickens and guinea fowl still sitting on various eggs. We'll see what they hatch--almost certainly some keets (baby guinea fowl, which will be rehomed when they're old enough because I do NOT want more guinea fowl) and maybe some call ducklings if I get really lucky!

I didn't want to write about it before the con because it's a slightly unhappy topic, but the day before I left for AX I put my first wild bird down myself. I have made the decision to euthanize many a wild bird, probably well into the dozens, but never done it myself. After Linda left the Intake Center, though, I got in a female goldfinch who had been caught by a cat. Allegedly the bird just had "a puncture wound in its wing," but it took me all of about five seconds of examination to discover the poor girl had a thoracic wound so severe that her intestines were literally hanging out. :( I spent about ten minutes calling around trying to find out how to use the euthanasia chamber (which can be very dangerous if used incorrectly) but had trouble getting in touch with Linda to find out. I was about to do the job myself with some sharp scissors because I didn't want her to suffer any longer, but on my last attempt at calling Linda before doing that I got in touch with her and got the instructions on using the chamber. Once I had those, I gently wrapped her in a towel, put her in the chamber, and put her to rest quickly, peacefully, and hopefully as painlessly as possible. I am thankful that the first euthanasia I've performed was on a bird that I was unattached to, and the fact that she needed to be put down was unambiguous. It's always a sad decision to make, but there was no doubt whatsoever what needed to happen. Anyway, I'm glad I know how to do it myself now in case I get in birds or other small animals that really just need to be put down, right away.

Too tired to write much else--going to go to bed now! I have payments to send and comments to reply to, but that'll just have to wait until tomorrow. I had a busy day today~

(no subject)

Awww, poor Salula got beat up... I feel I bad, all the birds were being nice to her for the last few weeks, and now suddenly this evening I found her in the corner with her face all swollen and eyelids messed-up. ;; It looks so painful. I hope she'll pull through this, she's been on a downhill decline health-wise for a long time, but on the other hand she's a tough old bird and has survived a lot. I cleaned off her face and disinfected it, unfortunately the eyelids are pretty bad and I can't do much for them. Just gotta wait for the swelling to go down, I guess. I may give her some aspirin if I can scrape off a tiny enough amount for just one bird. For those who don't who The Salula is, she's my wonderful crazy white chicken who I've had for twelve or thirteen years now. She mothers anything and everything and she's just a total sweetheart, albeit odd. She's legendary among my friends and I. I love her so much and will miss her terribly whenever she dies, but I also know she's had a long and mostly very happy life.

I never wrote about it, but Pen-Pen (the now sort of adolescent duckling) is having some health issues, too. Namely, for some reason his neck is twisted off to the side at a weird angle for some unknown reason. I have him in the backyard and he's getting vitamin enriched water and Tetracycline daily in hopes that it'll help. If the issue doesn't start to get better within a another five days of Tetracycline, I'm going to take him to the vet because it's a concerning issue. He's not having many other symptoms and does not seem to be in any pain or even discomfort, but twisting neck = spine issue = a definite concern, especially because it does seem to be progressively getting worse. It's possible it could be chlamydia psitacci, which is what his dad Tux had (and I'm kinda hoping this is what it is because I know how to treat that) but it's hard to say for sure.

Thankfully all other poultry are doing excellent! My four serama chicks in my room are getting bigger (and appear to be three hens and a rooster though nothing is guaranteed at this age), Eugenie and her young duckling are doing great, the quail are all outside and happy as can be, Splash and Charming are sitting on eight growing eggs so I should have more serama chicks at some point, and I have a whole pile of chickens and guinea fowl still sitting on various eggs. We'll see what they hatch--almost certainly some keets (baby guinea fowl, which will be rehomed when they're old enough because I do NOT want more guinea fowl) and maybe some call ducklings if I get really lucky!

I didn't want to write about it before the con because it's a slightly unhappy topic, but the day before I left for AX I put my first wild bird down myself. I have made the decision to euthanize many a wild bird, probably well into the dozens, but never done it myself. After Linda left the Intake Center, though, I got in a female goldfinch who had been caught by a cat. Allegedly the bird just had "a puncture wound in its wing," but it took me all of about five seconds of examination to discover the poor girl had a thoracic wound so severe that her intestines were literally hanging out. :( I spent about ten minutes calling around trying to find out how to use the euthanasia chamber (which can be very dangerous if used incorrectly) but had trouble getting in touch with Linda to find out. I was about to do the job myself with some sharp scissors because I didn't want her to suffer any longer, but on my last attempt at calling Linda before doing that I got in touch with her and got the instructions on using the chamber. Once I had those, I gently wrapped her in a towel, put her in the chamber, and put her to rest quickly, peacefully, and hopefully as painlessly as possible. I am thankful that the first euthanasia I've performed was on a bird that I was unattached to, and the fact that she needed to be put down was unambiguous. It's always a sad decision to make, but there was no doubt whatsoever what needed to happen. Anyway, I'm glad I know how to do it myself now in case I get in birds or other small animals that really just need to be put down, right away.

Too tired to write much else--going to go to bed now! I have payments to send and comments to reply to, but that'll just have to wait until tomorrow. I had a busy day today~