Thank you for your kind words, they are really appreciated! With parasites you need to know what you have because understanding their specific life-cycle is of tantamount importance. For example, you mention lice, which are host specific, they can not live for many hours off the bird. So treating the coop would do nothing, you would need to treat the bird: Here is the link to my two-part article and films on lice: holistic-hen.blogspot.com/2014/08/how-do-i-know-if-my-birds-have-lice.html#.VHHYtYXfu5k On the other hand red poultry mite spend only a few hours at night on the bird, so treating the coop is the way to get rid of them. In both cases there are also dietary considerations as many parasites feed on keratin from the bird's feather and an overproduction of keratin, due to Vitamin A deficiency, for example, can make a bird into a lice-magnet. You can find my articles on several types of parasites including information on their life-cycles on my site under the tab: 'Parasites and Other Health Problems'. Hope this helps and all the very best from a cold day in Normandie, Sue xx

@Pavlovafowl Thank you so much !!

@@JST2424 You are so welcome. All the very best Sue xx

During World War 1 and 2, hundreds of thousands of pigeons were used to carry messages across enemy lines because of their dedication to getting a job done and their intelligence in figuring things out. in emergencies. Many thousands were badly shot and injured but still carried on with their task and lived on, many receiving medals and fame. Therefore, a dog bite. unless the pigeon suffers uncontrolled blood loss, should be no great difficulty. However, the main and most crucial problem to address with any injured bird is stress/shock, not the injury itself. You will need to get electrolyte into the pigeon before you do anything else and calm it down by speaking to it and keeping it in a warm, calm low-noise, low-light place. I use a cardboard box with hay or any soft bedding material. You may need to put this box off the ground if the bird has been attacked just to give it a great sense of safety. No pigeon is the same, in my experience they all act differently when wounded but in every case, I have never know one refuse help when offered. What is amazing is, they remember acts of kindness and care. The pigeon in this film was semi-wild, it stayed with us for a couple of years and then flew away. Two years ago it came back, brought a mate with it and has been nesting in our barn ever since! Good luck and let me know how you get on and a BIG HUG for your pigeon, Sue

Exactly, hens are very fussy about where they lay and even though in my experience it is the male that chooses the nest site and makes the nest, they can still reject that too! All the very best from a very rainy Normandie, Sue

Yes and yes. The sad thing is there is little or no information/documentation on how these variations in colour first came into being. I think if I had created such beauty, I would want to have noted it down. However, as with the different breeds of chickens, such as the Sebright, for example, maybe people like to keep secrets - who knows. All the very best from rainy Normandie, Sue

HI there and thank you so much for your kind words, they are very much appreciated. You live in a continent rich in the heritage of healing clay and also edible clays too, so you hopefully should have no trouble in finding them. I know there is a therapeutic green clay from Africa, and also a famous red clay from the North, from Morocco and an edible pink clay 'Calaba' from West Africa, the Ivory Coast, this clay is considered an excellent wound healer too. I'm guessing you will probably find it at local markets or health stores sold in chunks that you can render down by soaking in water and then apply to your pigeon. For more in depth information on the protocols for using clay, please do visit my site for the written articles to accompany this film: holistic-hen.blogspot.com/2018/08/green-clay-treatment-wound-on-pigeon.html#.XrCc7Hcv6V4 and please do ask if you feel I can offer any further information. Give your pigeon a Big Hug from me and thank you for being so caring, Not many people would be cinsiderate enough to rescue wounded birds and I'm sure your pigeon appreciates it. All the very best from Normandie, Sue

Hi there, Yes, here I use clay because it is readily available but turmeric is a good substitute. I feed turmeric to my birds from time to time,, we use it when we cook rice for ourselves and the birds get the rice that is stuck to the bottom of the pan! Give your pigeon a big hug from me and Best Wishes from France, Sue

Hi there You are so welcome and well done you for caring - so many people don't, which is ironic as both now and in the past humans have relied heavily on pigeons for so many services,.This from carrying blood samples from hospitals to laboratories for analysis to delivering messages from war zones and often getting injured and/or shot in the process. There is even a chemist who strapped cameras to his pigeons and made a small fortune from aerial photography. Sometimes not flying can be a temporary state brought on by stress, when the pigeon has been attacked but the fact that he is eating and drinking is a great sign. Give him a big hug from me and let me know how he progresses. All the very best, Sue xx

Hi there, you have done exceedingly well to get so many quail broody, particularly when they have no background of being brought up by a mother and have been caged. My suggestion would be to observe closely the dynamics of your group and take your cue from their behaviour. There are no rules with quail, nor really with any domesticated bird because they have been removed and also selectively bred to avoid broodiness and motherhood, particularly quail, so they are re-finding their wild selves. There is so little literature and sadly so little funding or interest to do such studies that I have just found similarities in my broody quail with the few studies I came across from the 60s and 70s but everything else I have acquired just by observation. In my experience quail do seem to share nests and they do sometimes co-parent but behaviour is down to individuals and environment. It is so rare for quail to go broody that leaving them to their own devices, at the moment, to me would seem the best thing. One of my sitting quail actually began to actively chase the male away from guarding the nest just before the chicks hatched, so she solved the problem for me and I then separated him. It's all new territory and my advice would also be to write and if possible film your experiences because they are so helpful to others particularly because there is so little information out there. Is your male bonded to any of your females? That can make a big difference in how he fits into the group. Did he make the nest and has he guarded the nest or is he just generally hanging about around the females? The other problem is that no one really knows what the males role is with the chicks, as with cockerels or roosters but I've had roosters sit on chicks to keep them warm and others have had a rooster hatch eggs when the hen has died. I've also had male quail look after chicks too, so you see observation is key and then being ready to act if anything goes wrong. Hope this helps. Let me know how things go and all the very best, Sye xx

Yes I am, ask away.

@@Pavlovafowl Hi, I am so grateful you are on here. My Jenday parrot flew across his cage and tore his bottom foot, a hole near his toe nail insert. He is missing part of his bottom foot. The emergency vet filled the hole with liquid skin and flushed his wound and warned me it was deep. However he tore it off when we got home and stuck his foot at me to show me. Yes he is feisty. He has lost 3 tablespoons of blood from this wound. I read on your blog to use green clay I went through your entire sight. I ordered the same clay it should arrive by tonight. My Jenday’s foot now has a scab but it periodically bleeds. Should I still place the green clay on his wound if a scab is building the area is bright red. I did order a safe bird collar it will be here soon. This happened 3 weeks ago and he is still in the hospital cage I set up he is not walking but he is climbing but he is in pain. For pain I am using organic Lily of the desert inner Aloe leaf he drinks that and I apply it to his foot and he is on DMG for stress and eating out of all his food organic hemp seeds. I will be giving him Chamomile to relax and Nigella Sativa seeds to build collagen. Still he is in pain and I wanted to see what you recommend. Thank you for your help.

@@tajviper2596 Hi there, it sounds as if you are really on top of this - I find if a bird is eating then that is the very best indication that they are coping with the pain and the healing process. I have used clay on some terrible wounds on birds. You have been through my videos, so will have seen the pierced crop on my pigeon - that was a difficult one, just to keep the clay in place, as the pigeon was young and very inquisitive, so wanted to pull at the clay. I however managed to get the clay to set by holding the pigeon until the clay hardened and sealed the hole - i just put a long feature film on the computer and so we watched it together! Another bad wound I treated with clay was a rooster inflicted injury that took large areas of a hen's skin off her flanks. This, I originally just wrote up as an article on my site: The Holistic Hen, you can find it here: holistic-hen.blogspot.com/2016/07/treating-serious-roostercockerel-wound.html#.V50GzO2li1E Under the tab First Aid and Wounds you will also find other instances where I have used clay too, including foot wounds on birds. If it is still bleeding then I think it would be a good idea to use the clay because another of clay's virtues is to help close up wounds and stop them from bleeding. However, you are very right in wondering about putting the clay over the scabbed area, I believe I would just place it around the scab (leaving that uncovered and open to the air) and just seal in the area that is bleeding. You will also see in my article how parrots, in particular Macaws, as shown in the text, understand how clay works as they consume clay in order to protect themselves from the toxins in the seeds of fruits of which they are very fond and which would cause them harm if not for the clay. I think that is amazing. Humans in general completely underestimate the knowledge of birds and their understanding of self-medication. Perhaps your parrot thought the vet's remedy wasn't the right one for him? However, that is so typical to then show you what he had done. He injected some well needed humour into what is a very stressful episode, trying to do your best for your bird. In my article I also explain the protocol for using clay and also what I use as a painkiller. However, I do think you have some very good experience and ideas of your own for what works best for your bird. I for example, always find lavender essential oil works well to calm my birds when under stress but I will now be interested in your methods too. I was also unaware of the link between nigella sativa and collagen, that is very interesting, I believe in Arabic, the name for this plant means 'cures everything but death', so that doesn't surprise me. Give your Jenday Parrot a big hug from me, I looked it up, what a beautiful bird and yours sounds lots of fun too! All the very best, Sue

Thank you!

Thank you for your comment, I really appreciate it. I'm making shorts at the moment because I have so much other work piling up but I have several longer videos part-edited, so hopefully will be able to get them uploaded shortly. All the very best from Normandie, Sue

Hi and there is no problem with you asking me about this. We've raised four baby jackdaws -they fell down our chimney and we also had a jackdaw given to us by a friend because she was finding it difficult to cope with, it was badly injured and also a very grumpy individual! In my experience jackdaws are very bright and they do seem to figure out quite quickly (as do many rescued birds) that you are trying to help them. The problem may be that your one is getting mixed messages because normally when the bird falls down the chimney the rest of the brood and the parents have already left. Once you bring it in, it should start to concentrate on you as the parent and then it should be much easier for it to ask for and to accept food from you. It will be used to being fed directly into the beak, as it's only on leaving the nest for the ground that the babies are taught to start looking for their own food, although they are still being fed by the parent. A jackdaw, in my experience, usually fixes on one human to bond with. You are going to have to get close to it to feed it, it shouldn't snap at you or if it does it will only be in a scared-baby-reflex type of way. I usually start with egg and fruit and then I move onto worms or meal worms, which we raise for our quail, don't try and give it water, just juicy fruit. For ease of feeding you could start with pasta, but I would dip that in water first. It really though needs protein to grow, so don't feed too many carbs. I actually asked our organic butcher for meat scraps, which he gave me for free but some people collect road kill!! What sort of injuries does it have? Often these can just be stress related and will go away reasonably quickly once the initial shock of falling is over. Hope this is of use and please do feel free to ask for any other information you think I can help you with. Jackdaws are great birds and they really appreciate what you do for them. They make very strong bonds with humans. When we lived in Scotland our local Baker rescued one, it helped his business no end, as it used to sit on the wall outside his shop and then swoop down onto the arm of anyone coming out of the shop with a bag of pastries and look at them in such an appealing way that they felt obliged to feed it! Often, therefore, they would have to go back into the shop for more, so I guess it was the jackdaw's way of paying him back for the rescue! All the very best from Normandie, Sue

@@Pavlovafowl thanks a lot The jackdaw unfortunately left out sight last night and we didn’t have a chance to take it in But it’s followed its mother and from what we can tell it’s safe I really appreciate the reply though

Hi there, I do have a general poultry video showing the example of a week's food, that covers quail too: kzbin.info/www/bejne/rYucZqCChMibnaM However, many of my quail videos are about specific food items here is the playlist for you to choose: kzbin.info/www/bejne/jnaQiYmIid2fgqs I can give you a really important piece of advice in two words: 'invertebrate protein' - if you can raise your own by the creation of habitats (compost heaps, woodpiles, etc.,.) you will be providing the optimum food source for your quail. Too many people ignore the fact that quail are omnivores not grain eaters and a large proportion of their diet is wild protein with the addition of wild vegetation including broad-leaf plants and seed heads. I have never fed mine on readily prepared foods, for one we are organic here and even the commercial organic quail food relies too heavily on cultivated grain and legumes. Secondly, my initial reason for raising quail was to cure my husband's hay fever and I knew that to get therapeutic grade eggs my quail needed the best possible of wild diets. In the event I got hooked on keeping quail, so went on from there to continue with the best food possible for my quail and in particular the chicks needed this diet to grow and thrive. I also raise meal worms - organically for my quail and have videos on this too. Hope this helps and all the very best from Normandie, Sue

@Pavlovafowl thank you so much sue for your response, and I look forward to watching the videos to get more insight. It’s sooo very hard to find the information I’m looking for regarding quail, it’s all “stick them in a rabbit cage on highest protein game feed” :( I’m also looking to raise quail for quality eggs, however, I have a humble sized garden with frequent cat, fox and red kite visitors so regrettably I do think I will have to place them in an enclosure, but I hope to make it as natural as possible. Again thank you so much, the idea of poultry and game feeds is something that has really been bothering me as I thought it to be completely unnatural but not much info out there for alternatives, you have given me confidence to explore other organic natural options. All the best to you, Jayda, UK 🤗

Thank you so much for your comments. I love bats too, my sister used to live in a house where they had a colony of pipistrelles in the attic, when they came out at dusk it was magnificent!

Hi Sarah, The same as I am feeding here, you'll just need to mash it up add a little bottled, warmed water and he should be able to suck it up through your fingers or even from a egg cup. Here is my film showing feeding a really small pigeon: kzbin.info/www/bejne/sJCldYymo5WsZ5Y All the very best and get back to me and let me know how things are going, Sue xx

Thankyou so much for the advice. Very helpful. Appreciate it. Thankyou for taking the time in replying back to me. Have a great day. Sarah xxx

Hi Lilibeth, I have a two-part article on this at: holistic-hen.blogspot.com/2013/11/eye-problems-and-their-treatment-in.html#.VCGVMtZDu5k Sometimes with birds though, eye problems can be triggered by chronic stress and when the bird is removed from that situation, the condition will go away on its own. However, I would still make sure the bird has an electrolyte and also apply a compress to the eye of just warmed bottled water on an organic makeup pad or similar. The above written articles and accompanying film do however go into more detail on what could be wrong and how to remedy it. All the very best and do keep me up-to-date on how your pigeon progresses, Sue xx

Thank very much. I ordered it to treat the pigeon.

They get flu like humans?

He is indeed! All the very best, Sue

Thank you! All the very best, Sue

We make it. Here is our compost bin design: kzbin.info/www/bejne/fonOlKGan7KnirM We now have 3 compost bins altogether and in the Winter I put a small one of ready rotted compost in with the quails so they have a self-service food source! All the very best, Sue

Yes because not only does it heal but it provides essential minerals as well. Clay is often used in setting broken limbs. My friend completely healed her Collie dog's broken leg which the vet had declared inoperable, he was so impressed, he now uses clay in his practice. It's a very ancient medicine and was/is used all over the World in traditional medicine. All the very best from Normandie, Sue

You are so welcome, let me know how things work out. The major problem may be getting him to keep it on but I have found pigeons to be very cognizant of the healing process but young birds do sometimes 'play about' with the clay as they are very inquisitive! All the very best and thank you so much for saving a pigeon! Sue

@@Pavlovafowl It is working alright, I look at the wound almost everyday, and now he starting to exercise the wings, it is for me almost a miracle his recover.

Hi Deborah, Are you a member of Instructables? - If so you can publish a picture for me on say this Instructable: www.instructables.com/How-to-treat-a-deep-and-badly-infected-wound-on-an/ You can also send me a message - just press the 'I made it' button and the facility will come up. If not then I'm sure we can work out a way but the most important thing is to make sure she is not in pain - so use the wash and that she has electrolyte. I'm sorry I couldn't get back any more quickly but I was away in the UK and I have no internet access there, ironically I left on the day before you posted the comment! Give your hens a big hug from me and also think about making them a 'saddle' so that this doesn't happen again - I have a pattern for that here: holistic-hen.blogspot.com/2015/11/caring-for-chickens-in-cold-weather.html#.VjdJwpdVKlM It's the same design as this coat I made for a Frizzle suffering from cold stress. All the very best, Sue xx

Thank you! All the very best, Sue

Thank you for your kind words! All the very best, Sue

Thank you! All the very best, Sue

Thank you for your lovely words. Yes, you'll always get a response, albeit a little late - I'm repainting the house, so not doing much on the internet at the moment - except binge watching dog rescue videos! In the lettuce leaf is a mix of all organic food: grated root vegetables, sprouted triticale (an ancient wheat/rye mix), moistened 5 cereals (rolled) comprising, oats, wheat, barley, rice and rye. However, the grains are something I only feed in strict moderation. For quail chicks and hen chicks, I like to get them started from hatch as would their parent, on invertebrate protein and if not readily available then hard boiled egg. All the very best from Normandie, Sue