Posts

Rest in Peace Buffy

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Those that follow my Instagram would have known that our beautiful Buffy had a short but fierce battle with cancer. He was sadly helped over the rainbow bridge on the 19th of May. It all started with his ongoing throat infection. A pussy plaque in this throat that was treated several times with antibiotics. When it came back again, he was switched to a different type and then reassessed. With no significant improvement, the vet decided to do a more thorough investigation as to why the infection would not go away. During the surgery, they found a lump underneath the infection, they took a biopsy and sent it away for pathology tests. It came back as cancer, that had metastasized, meaning that it had spread. It was diagnosed as squamous cell carcinoma, basically skin cancer, and the outcome was not good, especially if it had metastasized. The vet said it would eventually get into his lungs and effect his breathing. He was given a few months to live. We got 5 months. We could se

Hormone implants for chickens

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Yesterday we made the decision to have a hormone implanted into Spot. This decision was made because she had very thin, wrinkly shelled eggs that no amount of calcium supplementation was able to fix. Spot ran the risk of having an egg break inside of her during laying, which could lead to a fatal infection.  I had heard of a hormone implant that would stop her from laying eggs, which would allow her body to recover (she has pretty much laid non stop for about 2.5 years). With a vet examining her eggs and confirming that she would benefit with the implant, we went ahead. I had posed this question on the Chicken Instagram community and received a lot of questions about it. So I thought I would share what I have learned and the vet's comments. What is Suprelorin? Suprelorin is the trade name given to the hormone implant. Proud to say that this implant is an Australian invention! Manufactured by Peptech Animal Health in NSW, the patent was granted in 2002. Looking through the p

Purple carrot rose cheesecake

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Another purple hued bakery item and yet again using purple carrots to give the vibrant purple colour. It's basically vegetables so it doesn't count as dessert right? 😃

Ivermectin for chickens

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So on some chicken forums I've heard that people are using Ivermectin "off-label" to treat their poultry for parasites (such as mites and lice) and they recommend an egg witholding period of 7 days. It's off-label as there have been very few studies looking at the metabolism of this drug through avians. In December last year, there has been one scientific study done on Ivermectin and poultry. So is there a clear answer to it's safety in poultry and more importantly, how long before you can eat the eggs?

Purple blush bread

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How about adding some colour to your food and sneaking in a few veggies as well? This purple blush bread uses purple carrots for that perfect hue and paired with the soft, fluffy and sweet bread, it is perfect just on it's own or with a pat of butter.

Bantam egg yolks? As big as normal sized chicken yolks?

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There is this idea going around that egg yolks from bantam chickens are the same size as yolks from normal sized chickens (actually, someone on Instagram asked me to find out). I have to say, the first time we cracked our bantam's egg, we thought the yolk looked the same size as our normal laying hens egg. So just to prove this point, I did a bit of literature research. So is it true, bantam yolks are the same size as normal yolks?

Tutorial - Make a chicken silhouette using Photoshop

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Don't chicken silhouettes look awesome? And roosters with their distinctive tail make the images look amazing. I'll show you how you can make one of your own chicken using Photoshop (yes alas, I only know how through Photoshop) and a picture of your chicken.