Three days ago I found my emu Stuart down in the pasture. This is totally abnormal behavior for him so I knew something was wrong. I approached him and he stood up and it was clear he was injured. He had a bad limp. I went to the house to get help from Michael. We decided to herd Stuart into the pasture with Chica so he could heal his leg. Chica is much less likely to chase him than Loca. We left Loca and Louis in the lower pasture and moved Stuart with Chica in the upper pasture.
Stuart limped to the upper right hand corner of the pasture and laid back down. I took him food and water and checked on them often in case a fight broke out. Luckily they got along fairly well and now, three days later his limp is barely noticeable. I took some video and you can see Chica messes with him a little, but for emus, this is mild.
In the video you can see Chica strutting and hear her drumming. This was taken the first day and Stuart’s limp is better. I’ll take new video tomorrow. We are hoping they will continue to get along well and we can leave them together. This is mating season and two pairs means less fighting than one girl and two boys. We’ll have to see.