Wren - what a handsome sweater that would make - and your dog would be much cooler as a result. A win-win situation!
Thanks Luvs - it's always a good feeling to know that you've done the right thing by helping some animals who could not help themselves.
Grownut - felting apparently is very good with the Icelandic wool. Have never tried it. Maybe when I finish with school and go back to having copious amounts of spare time... (LOL)
I made a chicken coat because of a rescue.
Ha! Not holding my breath, I guess...
The pictures look like they could be turkens.
I only had one, Ozzie, a roo, but he was my favorite.
And yes, the neck does get sunburned if they are out in the sun. These pictures were taken about late in the summer.
Will put in a couple of pictures of him.
Another Picture of Ozzie
I'm really hoping that she is a turken, although admittedly she has feathers missing all over, so even if she is, she still needs to grow back feathers elsewhere besides her neck.
We have hens missing feathers too, but we can thank our roosters for that usually.
Although we did have one hen that we named Feather Plucker. The rooster that she was in with started looking kind of rough so we watched them. He would just stand there and let him pick the feathers out of him...........LOL
They were both Ameraucana chickens.
oops her...........he would stand there and let her pick the feathers out of him.
Typo
Claire, what I noticed in your pic was that there were no "pores" on the neck where the feathers would be... Right away I thought naked neck. When they are missing feathers, you can see where the feathers used to be... in your pic, the skin looks smooth with no tell tale signs of feathers missing till you go further down the back of her neck where they were supposed to be. Does that make sense? I'd bet it is a naked neck for sure..
I think you're right ZZ. She is missing feathers in lots of other places and I can see the pores there, so I think she is a NN hen, and she is the only one. She and the other one are still wearing their coats. I should come up with names for them. Orchid and Plum?
Those are great names. I am on a mission to have naked necks... I love them!
Funny how some people think they are hideous and others darling.. LOL I'm the latter.. I LOVE THEM
I never had one before and she is sweet, but I find the redness of her neck a bit upsetting. I guess because so many of these birds are clearly somewhat neglected, it just makes her look worse. When she grows back her other feathers, maybe I will feel differently, but right now, she just looks pathetic in a really sad way.
I've been reading a lot about naked necks cause I'm on a mission to have some. Says they are REALLY tough and hardy... resistant to disease, etc. My bet is that she will be fine.. and probably SO glad to be with you!!! I just love her.. Just think that bright red neck is good blood flow, contributing to her health and recovery. :)
Sounds like the mom has ADD, since she forgot that she is the parent, the child is 7, the child has ADD, and any child would need to be supervised when given the responsibility of a life.
One of my guineas got mauled by my dog after flying into the backyard. She was not hurt bad initially, only having some back feathers pulled out. A few days later, my wife saw several guineas pecking her. I thought about a mercy kill, but after posting on Daves, I bought CORONA Ointment from D&L feed. I did not follow all of the instructions, but did wash her and apply ointment once a day for three or four days and she healed up fine.
I agree Excel - I think that the mom was more to blame than the kid because any parent with a child with ADD should know that they need a little extra help or checking up on, especially when it comes to a responsibility that involves animal lives.
Sadly, one of the two worst cases died today, but the rest are all still fine, so I hope for the best.
I just found this thread. Commander Moxon, you are sincerely TOO MUCH!!! Your place in heaven is absolutely assured. Not only going out of your way for those chickens, but to make them coats! Wow. Just WOW.
That place sounds like something between a breeding operation and a puppy mill to me. It may be legit, but sounds more like a sheer income source. Maybe not enough for criminal activity, but imho a reputable breeder would not chain a dog to a tree routinely. Maybe now and then, and maybe she just did it to stop the slaughter. If it made you uncomfortable enough, you could tell the ASPCA or the HSUS and let them take a look. That's a WHOLE LOTTA DOGS. But you said they looked healthy enough. I don't know.
Anyway, kudos for the chicken coats! And sweet Rosie makes an awesome model.
Thanks Brigidlily - I just felt it was the right thing to do. I need to make some more coats for winter because some of the girls just won't grow feathers back until their next molt, most likely in spring. I am so happy with them though. You should see them now when I go out into the yard. (they are free ranging now). They come running over to me when I come out the back door as if they haven't seen me in weeks and I'm their best friend. I know, that is anthropomorphizing in the worst way, and all they really want is food, but I get down on their level and say hello to everybody, and some of them seem to want a little pat on the back, and they all cluster around. Now, my other hens that I had before don't really do that, except Rosie, so I don't know why the difference in behaviour, but it suits me just fine.
If there is a heaven, hopefully they'll consider me, although I am mostly just spiritual and not religious, so that might disqualify me. ;-)
thats terrible!!!!!!!:( im so glad that u got them in time! and those coats are such a cool idea. maybe me and karbear will make some for our hens!!!!!:)
I had a mean rooster and he plucked several of my hens. When they went into maolt this fall all thier feathers came back. I have made chicken aprons for some of my hens because one rooster favors particular hens and his spurs scrape the feathers off their backs. good luck with the chickens!
Come on Chickengal - show us your aprons! We love to see chickens in outfits!!
Caire, you are so kind to take care of the poor, naked chickens! I have often wished I could make a kelvar outfit for my sweet Speckles. She would love to have the freedom of our yard, but there are way too many hawks so she only gets to go for supervised walks. I have, however, made her a Christmas coat complete with white "fur" trim. We kept getting Christmas cards from a friend that included photos of her Scottie and Westie in various costumes. So, I decided my pet chicken should have a Christmas outfit too and we sent her photo in our card to the dog owner. Speckles didn't appreciate the Santa hat or ankle bows at all. The following year I made her angel wings and a halo. She was very patient, but just doesn't go for the dress up thing at all. I hope all your abused chickens are doing better and enjoying their warm wraps! Rosie was quite a trooper too.
turkens, showgirls and anything with a naked neck gene is hardy,lol. yes their little necks can be quite funny looking more so the red necks than the black ones and people may feel sorry for them but even in winter those little necks give off some heat!!!u need not make them little neck warmers they will withstand the cold no problem. although i don't know i like to quilt and sew mabe i'll make my girls some fancy dud's for x-mas,lol could be lots of fun!! i'm trying to make flightsuits for the pigeons and coats for the pups so why not make something for everyone!! mike will think i'm crazy but oh well will give me something to do now that i can't garden outside.
Claire, I think we can't help anthropomorphizing; we couldn't avoid Disney as children, and we just tend to do it anyway. But I am convinced that critters that have been rescued are very well aware they have been, and who did it! And while other creatures' capacity to appreciate may be very limited, I believe all God's creatures can develop affection, if only for their food source!
Except chiggers. They're just plain mean.
OK, is there anyone near Green Bay Wisconsin, or Marinette Wisconsin that rasies Naked Neck Turkens?
We lost the only one that we had :( A very pretty looking one. And in the spring, I would love to have some more of them............Not sure if my boyfriend will want them though.......LOL
Just kidding. Him and I talked about trying to find some this coming spring. He never wanted the Turkens, because he didn't care for the looks of them in all the pictures that he had seen of them. But I got the only one we had, that had been a school prodject. Then the Teacher that had them raised them in a wire pen...............Their poor feet!! The 3 chickens I got were missing toe nails and had a hard time with balance for a while.
And yes, they don't mind the cold at all.........They can live in Wisconsin winters without a problem.
(we lost ours in the summer)
Thank you "SEW much" for your story. Would you mind giving me a few rough measurements on that coat? My Alice has lost so much underfeather (lice? mites?) it breaks my heart. She is the sweetest lady I've got, really wants to be a house person instead of an outdoor chicken. I'm not a very good seamstress. I'm hoping i can just cut some fleece or maybe lightly felted wool and it will last through the winter. Thank you for your rescue job, your post, and your good animal mothering in general.
Hi Toltin,
I have attached a picture of the coat (ready to be washed so sorry it's dirty!) and shown the measurements. It was pretty easy.
1. Cut out the shape to roughly the dimensions I show, maybe adding a half inch at each end if you are going to hem it. I only hemmed top and bottom, not sides.
2. Use fleece if you don't want to hem it because it doesn't unravel from the edges.
3. I hemmed along the "collar" part to give it more form. I just rolled over the edge of the fleece and stitched it down. Then I hemmed the bottom edge.
4. At this point, I tried it on the hen. I kind of felt where her shoulders/wings started and made little marks on the fleece so I knew where to cut the wing holes.
5. I did zig-zag stitch around the wing hole cut outs just for support. To cut out the wing holes, I folded the fabric in half from the point that I had marked, and used the scissors to just cut out a small portion along the fold line, so that it was wider than just a slit, but not too big so that their wings come right out. Fleece is nice and stretchy.
6. I used velcro for the attachment at the neck. I sewed that on and I sewed on a longer piece of the "fluffy" side and a small piece of the "scratchy" side so that it is adjustable.
You can see in the picture that the fluffy side is the long black piece in the upper left, and the small "scratchy" bit is on the opposite side of the fabric so you can only see the little rectangle of stitching right at the right hand end of the collar part.
Let me know if you have any questions. It really isn't hard to do! The hen will initially act a bit freaked out by it and possibly walk backwards for a while. This is sort of funny to watch. Within about 10 minutes, mine seemed to have adapted to their coats.
Claire
you are great. thank you so much. i'll whip that up tomorrow and then i can sleep easier. Here is alice and her friend Mikey-back when she had more feathers. Liz
Alice is lovely! She has beautiful color in her neck feathers. I am impressed with Mikey. We have some mice in the barn and would like a barn cat but I worry about the smaller bantam chickens around a cat.
I hope you will post a picture of your hen coat when you have it made!
i will. I thought Alice looked a lot like Rosie, who is just a hoot, covering herself to lay. They are so funny; you never know what they'll come up with next. Mikey used to be more useful, but as you can see, nowadays he's too laid back. i THINK i saw a certain smallish quickly-moving animal in the BASEMENT today, but we do have TWO CATS and i refuse to believe that both of them .... well, we just might be cuttin' back on the kibbles a little, that's all i'm sayin is all.
Here are Alice and her late partner Gertrude, as Building Inspectors.
