Update on Beaker

Beaker is our hen who had the mild vent prolapse (where the vent partially inverts and comes out) seems to have healed pretty well.  I'm happy to report that we haven't had to put a finger where the sun doesn't shine for about 2 days now, nor have we had to slather the poor girl with foul-smelling Preparation H.

She, understandably, didn't appreciate our loving attention.

We now have a new problem with Beaker, though it's one that seems well-timed: Beaker is broody.  This means that a hormonal switch has flipped in her body and she will attempt to hatch just about anything that remotely ressembles an egg. 

At this very moment she's sitting on 2 golf balls and a promotional rubber ball G-man got somewhere.  The ball lights up when it bounces, so I whacked it on the side of the nesting box, stuffed the red and blue blinking ball under the puffed-up white hen, and amused myself watching her light up like a flashing cop car.

Hey, it's Friday night, hubbie's at work late, we don't have cable, and I don't have any books to read.

Ohhhh.  Shiney and blinky!

Given Beaker's recent prolapse brought on by huge-mongous eggs, I'm going to let her be broody for a few days because she won't lay eggs during that time.  I tried to put her in the yard to see if she could be distracted from her broodiness but she drove me nuts trying to get back into the run for over an hour.  When I finally let her back into the run she made a beeline for the nesting box and has been there ever since.

Here's a video of a broody hen sitting on... well, on something a bit surprising. 

Too bad roosters are illegal in the city or I might consider giving her some fertilized eggs to hatch.  That would be super cute.

Maybe I'll just screw with her instead and see what kinds of crazy things she'll try to incubate.  I once heard about someone's silkie hen who tried to hatch a plastic truck and a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle action figure.

I love how the chick looks so confused.