Very happy sick chicken

A very good day today for my Mindy girl! She had more energy today than she has had in a few days and was up for strolling around the house. She has been staring at herself in her reflection on the dishwasher in the kitchen for a couple of days when she's out and about with me so I figured since she had some energy, it would be nice for her to see her real reflection in a real mirror. So I took her to my third floor spare bedroom that has a giant mirror propped up against the wall and plopped her down in front of it. She LOVED it! She was so interested in her new friend and kept looking behind the mirror to sort out what was going on. She settled into simply staring at herself for a good 20 minutes and ended up falling asleep with her new "friend". Here's some pictures from her experience




She also seems to be passing more of the impact ion from her crop. She's been passing mostly water with the occasional semi-solid diarrhea poo. Tonight, however, she passed 3, count em', 3, solid, beautiful poops with hay pieces and other "undigestables" as I call them. I am a much happier chicken mama today than I was yesterday! fingers crossed that the crop is empty tomorrow morning! Tomorrow will be the one week mark from when we noticed the impaction!

Fantastic!
I love the photo's

tjo804 said:

Fantastic!
I love the photo's

Click to expand...

Thanks! We had a lot of fun today, I spent almost the whole day loving on her. I needed it after yesterday's loss I'm still trying to wrap my head around it. It's very discouraging when you're treating a sick chicken and a healthy one suddenly dies out of nowhere. My husband and I kept getting up in the middle of the night to make sure Mindy was still alive, we were SO paranoid after what happened to Norma yesterday even though it had NOTHING to do with what's going on with Mindy lol I think i am regaining my equilibrium now though after such a great day with my girl

thanks so much for your input over the last day or two, it's been so nice to have support during my first encounter with any sort of health problem with my girls. Its good to know I'm not alone here. I feel like you're all here with me helping take care of her. I'll need to give all of you guys the credit when she makes it to the other side of this

She who does the work gets the credit!
Pat yourself on the back and then give DH a big ole hug
You will both have earned it.

so give us an update, how is Mindy?

Mindy's crop has been clear of the hay/grass knot for a couple of weeks now. It took a total 3 weeks to pass! Lots of massaging after she drank water seemed to work the best. Thank goodness she drank so well through the whole thing! She lost 2/3 of her body weight over those 3 weeks though and you could see her breast bone protruding through her feathers. She slept basically all day and would only eat apples, tomatoes, and mealworms for about a week. Her energy is significantly better now, she has barely slept during the day and when she does its only for 5 minutes or so.

Her weight bottomed out at 2.6lbs and as of this morning she weighs 4.25lbs!! She's still living in my house though. She's still too skinny and she went into a partial molt so her feathers aren't as thick as they should be to handle the cold temperatures of a New England winter. She can free range for a couple hours when it's above 45° but that isn't every day that the temperatures are that warm here. She gets stronger and stronger and sassier and sassier every day. Reintegrating into the flock will be quite the process since its been almost 2 months. I have been bringing in one of the nicer BO hens she used to buddy up with and after a half day of mingling they seemed to have settled into old routines. I have 2 leghorns outside that won't be so easy to reestablish old relationships with. They can get aggressive and Mindy doesn't tolerate aggression very well. If someone tiffs with her she will keep tiffing until the other one stops. She's not a confrontational bird by any stretch of the imagination, she's usually one of the lower hens on the totem pole, but she won't give up a fight when antagonized.

She also has swollen ankles and feet. The swelling is significantly better as of the last few days so I hope it continues to go down. She's eating 1/4-1/3lb of crumbled pellets each day now and I have figured out how to make her eat eggs, which she gave me the stink eye about when I tried before. She will only eat them if they've been fried, over easy, in bacon fat. She's a diva! She still won't eat whole pellets but as long as she eats the crumbles, I'm happy enough.

The only problem I'm seeing right now is her droppings. She hasn't had a normal, balled up chunk of poop since before all of this happened. It's very watery and loose. She does at least pass her normal cecal poop a few times a day but the rest of it is weird. I'll get a pic next time she poops. I haven't been too worried about the diarrhea since her body is still not normal. I'll really start to worry about it when her weight is back to normal and has been for some time. I can only imagine how messed up her system has been from everything that it's been through.

So that's the update on my little princess house chicken. She's currently mashing herself against the kitchen heater we have under our steps to the living room. She's sprawled out with a leg and wing stretched. She is a little diva!

How is she doing now? @bmayer