Most chickens don’t have long lives (see my post about how long chickens live) but a few sturdy birds manage to survive respiratory diseases and escape reproductive tract malfunctions and live on into old age. Even then, they rarely die peacefully in their sleep. Old chickens are prone to tumors, cancer and blockages of their intestinal tracts. Internal layers that survive peritonitis can have large masses in their body cavities that will eventually interfere with body organs. I do necropsies, and have seen all of these things. All of these conditions can cause a hen to suffer, sometimes just for days, sometimes for weeks.

Then again, an old hen can go sedately along, with something obviously wrong (look at Twinkydink’s grey comb!) and yet still get pleasure from a sun bath and take part in the social life of the flock. An old hen like Twinkydink you can leave well enough alone.

If you intend to let your hens retire (and not dispose of unproductive hens as real farmers must do) then you will be faced with knowing when to let a hen live out her days, and when it is kinder to euthanize. This is a decision that I make on a daily basis about Buffy. She’s survived many ailments. At almost eight years of age, she is ancient and feeble. She can no longer hop out of the coop in the morning. I have to carry her to a spot in the sun.

But, Buffy is not yet suffering. I know this because of a few things that she still can do. Buffy can stand on her own and eat and drink. In fact, she continues to eat with gusto. A hen that is too weak to eat is truly ill.

Buffy is not harassed by the other hens, and in fact will peck at those who get into her space. The other hens recognize weakness, so although to my eye Buffy is wobbly, she has maintained her status in the flock. A truly sick hen will hide, or be attacked by others.

That said, it is clear that much is amiss with Buffy, She no longer has the strength in her legs to roost, which means she’s below everyone else at night. Sometimes she gets pooped on. Being a soft-feathered Orpington, the manure sinks down into her coat and sticks there, unseen. Yuck.

Being a weak old hen, Buffy can’t preen those feathers, and so today, using scissors, I carefully snipped off the manure.

I was concerned that Buffy was filthy in other places too, and so I gave her a warm epsom salt bath.

I was relieved to see that her bottom was clean and healthy. Her manure is normal, not runny and sticky. She had a few lice crawling on her, but it wasn’t the sort of infestation that happens to sick hens who can’t dust bathe.

Buffy was skeptical that all of this fussing was necessary.

It’s too cold to go outside with wet feathers, so I blew her dry, which she seemed to like. When done, she had enough energy to stand up and glare at me.

Buffy is at the end of her life. She cannot walk more than a few steps without sitting down. She’s skinny – it’s likely that her body can no longer efficiently digest the food that she does eat, and so I do give her a small handful of sunflower seeds and corn in the morning. (High value food, in a small amount, gives her a boost, however, do NOT feed your ailing hen with a syringe or force gruel into them. If a hen isn’t eating or drinking, there’s likely something blocking the passageways inside and you will make matters worse.)

But Buffy is not done yet. She eats her corn and sunflower seeds right up in the morning, and woe to anyone who wants to share! When Buffy is no longer able to stand, if her vent area becomes raw from diarrhea, if she becomes infested with lice, if she no longer eats and drinks, then I’ll know her time is up. I don’t want her to suffer, and sadly, many older hens do as they waste away at the end. I won’t let that happen to Buffy; I will euthanize her. For now though, she has a patch of sun to enjoy.

The Mystery of the Thin Shelled Egg has been solved by Nancy Drew, herself!

Throughout September and October, Nancy Drew laid only a couple of eggs a week, and those were thin-shelled and easily broken (and then eaten by Betsy Ross, the pesky little bantam White Leghorn.)

What caused her eggs to be so fragile? The flock’s diet is excellent, and the other hens are laying sturdy eggs, so food wasn’t the culprit. Sometime disease can cause thin eggs, but then the eggs will be wrinkly or misshapen, and Nancy’s eggs were smooth, so that lead was a dead end. Sometimes hens are genetically predisposed to laying poor quality eggs, but some of Nancy’s were fine. So, what was to blame?

Nancy Drew pondered the mystery. She sat in her nesting box and thought. She sat and thought some more. And it was that very sitting and thinking that solved the problem! It takes more than 25 hours from the time that a yolk is released from the ovary until an egg is formed and released out of the uterus. Twenty of those hours are spent in the shell gland. At the end of the process, the hen needs to sit quietly while the shell finishes being constructed. A chicken that is agitated and jumps in and out of the box, or a hen that never settles into the box, will lay fragile eggs. Nancy Drew was one of those hens. She didn’t give her egg-making apparatus enough time.

But, Nancy has learned patience and she has solved the case of her own thin-shelled eggs. She’s now laying four eggs a week, and they’re all perfect.

You might have noticed a change in the bedding in the Little Barn. I am trying out a brand new type of chicken coop bedding. It’s a combination of chopped straw, chopped hay and an odor and moisture absorbing material. A farm in northern Maine has come up with this product, which, if it’s successful, will help the environment and economy up there, as well as make your coop nicer. I’ll fill you in on all of the details once the trial is over. For now, I can tell you that the barn smells like a barn should – fragrant like a field in the summer – and it’s dry.

Phoebe approves.

Pearl, my beautiful splash Cochin, usually looks like a feather duster that would have been used in a Victorian mansion.

Cochins are fluffy because they have many more soft feathers than other breeds. Also, they lack hard, shiny outer feathers. But, each year, just like all other chickens, Cochins drop their thousands of feathers and grow in new ones. This should happen just once. But, for some reason, Pearl went through an early, partial molt in July. I wasn’t surprised, because the worst layers molt first, and Pearl rarely lays. After the molt, she went broody for weeks. Then, mid-October she roused herself from her broody stupor and went into a second molt.

Pearl has so many feathers that at first, you might not notice that she is molting. From a distance, Pearl appears to be as lovely as ever.

But, look closely, and you’ll see that her coat appears looser. New feathers are emerging on the wings. And her bottom looks like this. (It’s obvious when the wind is blowing!) No wonder normally friendly hens don’t want to be picked up during the molt. Would you want to be handled with quills sticking out of your bottom?

Cochins have feathered feet, and even those feathers fall out and new ones grow in. Looking at her legs, I became worried, as the scales are sticking out and not smooth like they should be. Was this scaly leg mite?

No, it was just the new feather shafts pushing their way out. It does look uncomfortable, doesn’t it?

A few more weeks and Pearl will be fully dressed again. Have patience, Pearl!

PS Because I know you’ll ask – I don’t do much different for my molting hens. They appreciate dust baths, so I make sure that they free-range and that their dust bathing bin in the coop is full and clean. I’m careful not to feed bread and pasta as treats, but do toss them a handful of my dog’s expensive fish kibble every few days, because the chickens need quality protein in order to regenerate their feathers. (But, overdoing the protein can cause problems, so I use restraint.) I recently got some chopped alfalfa, which is very good for them. Older hens can have a bit more trouble getting through the molt, so the ancient chickens in the Little Barn are getting a handful of shelled sunflower seeds (not much, a tablespoon per bird!) per day. But, really, all that they need is time and patience.

Even with daylight savings time, mornings have been dark, and very cold. We’ve turned off the outside water. A line of frost outlines each leaf in the yard. There’s been ice in the outside chicken waterers. One morning it was 22 degrees F. I pulled the last of the green bean plants and fed them to the animals. Brown leaves are piling up in the corners of my vegetable garden. With some relief, I thought that I was done with the garden for the season. But the other day I had a sudden thought. Did I pull the carrots? I had forgotten all about them!

This has happened before. Last time I didn’t remember until after the ground had frozen solid. I had to wait for a thaw to pry them up, by which time the roots had turned to mush. But this time look at what I found underground!

Carrots harvested after the first frost are especially sweet. They’re so good we’ve been eating them raw, but I’ll cook them up, too. Some I’ll dress with honey and ginger. How do you cook your carrots?

The goats don’t need any fancy preparations. They got the tops (and a few of the carrots too small to bother with). There was much delighted munching, crunching and burping.

Now the gardening season is really, truly over.