gloryfades09
Hatching
- Dec 16, 2015
- 3
- 0
- 7
hello! i feel guilty about this situation and hope i can find some help here, and also hope to not end up feeling even more guilty.
my husband and i have had chickens for about 3 years now. we've lost a couple here and there due to raccoons and what we believe was a fox, as well as 2 random deaths from quick unknown illnesses. as far as the predators go, we've further protected our coop and run and the current chickens have been save so far. (we started with 8, gotten a few more on a couple occasions, and now we have 5.)
with the 2 quick deaths from illnesses, they happened so quickly that we never really investigated what could have been wrong...and the other chickens at the times never got sick. looking back, i wish we had researched more and medicated them. we just never really looked into it.
anyway!! now, one of our old girls from our first flock has been very sick for the last week or so (hence the guilt) and we have no idea what's wrong. she has not been quarantined and the other girls have been fine. the only odd thing is that our egg production has dropped sigificantly to one every other day. we've had decreases in output around winter before but this is far less than usual. so, the wyandotte's eyes are incredibly swollen and she has not come out into the run. she's essentially acting like she's blind. my husband bought "Vet Rx" in hopes that it'd help, but we're on day 4 or so of him using it, to no avail. i just have no idea what we should do. honestly, i thought she would have passed by now but she's still hanging on. she's not laying down or anything so isn't THAT lethargic, and mostly seems to not be moving around much due to such poor visibility. also, the skin around her face and a bit in her waddle and comb is orangey....a bit pale, most noticeably around the eyes.
again, i feel like a dummy for not having reached out much earlier, but i really hope someone can advise. in the meantime, we'll be buying a book on backyard chickens so we can be better prepared for future issues and illnesses.
thanks so much.
jess
my husband and i have had chickens for about 3 years now. we've lost a couple here and there due to raccoons and what we believe was a fox, as well as 2 random deaths from quick unknown illnesses. as far as the predators go, we've further protected our coop and run and the current chickens have been save so far. (we started with 8, gotten a few more on a couple occasions, and now we have 5.)
with the 2 quick deaths from illnesses, they happened so quickly that we never really investigated what could have been wrong...and the other chickens at the times never got sick. looking back, i wish we had researched more and medicated them. we just never really looked into it.
anyway!! now, one of our old girls from our first flock has been very sick for the last week or so (hence the guilt) and we have no idea what's wrong. she has not been quarantined and the other girls have been fine. the only odd thing is that our egg production has dropped sigificantly to one every other day. we've had decreases in output around winter before but this is far less than usual. so, the wyandotte's eyes are incredibly swollen and she has not come out into the run. she's essentially acting like she's blind. my husband bought "Vet Rx" in hopes that it'd help, but we're on day 4 or so of him using it, to no avail. i just have no idea what we should do. honestly, i thought she would have passed by now but she's still hanging on. she's not laying down or anything so isn't THAT lethargic, and mostly seems to not be moving around much due to such poor visibility. also, the skin around her face and a bit in her waddle and comb is orangey....a bit pale, most noticeably around the eyes.
again, i feel like a dummy for not having reached out much earlier, but i really hope someone can advise. in the meantime, we'll be buying a book on backyard chickens so we can be better prepared for future issues and illnesses.
thanks so much.
jess
