My chickens keep on dying :( One after another

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tmlpike

tmlpike

Songster
6 Years
May 16, 2013
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Canada
Anyone who has any knowledge on what they think this may be, please help.

A little background info: We have had chickens for a very long time now, around 20 years. We have an inside area for them as well as a large fenced area outside. After every 2 years, we would get rid of our chickens and get new ones the following spring. However, I have become attached to our chickens, so my parents are letting me keep the ones I've named. They are 3 years old now. We have a mixture of plymouth rock chickens, and brown and white ones. We feed them Mixed Grain and Laying Ration. Our chickens eat each other's poop (the grain in the poop) and they also pluck feathers off each other and then eat them.

It all started last summer. I noticed one of our chickens who did NOT look healthy. Her tail was droopy, her comb turned purple, and she had her eyes closed. This lasted for for many days. And she stopped eating completely, no matter what we gave her. The ONLY thing she would eat was the buds that would fall of our trees. She lost ALOT of weight, and would sleep standing up. However, she made a full recovery, which shocked me completely. But after a week had gone by she got sick again suddenly and died.

Ever since this has happened, it seems like it keeps on happening to our other chickens. One dies, and another gets sick. We have had about 7 die over 10 months. They all have pretty much the exact same symptoms. Our older chickens get sick most often, but a young one has died too. It must be contagious, because one chicken after another dies.

SYMPTOMS:
-droopy tail (although not all of them)
-stops eating
-stops laying eggs
-Extremely tired!
-closes eyes all day and sleeps standing up
-looses color in the face
-dramatic weight loss
-diarreha
-every single chicken who was sick has died

We can't have our chickens suffering, so my dad shot the really sick one. When he shot her, white liquid poured out of her mouth! No blood. Very strange!!

Any information would be extremely helpful! I love my chickens so much, and I can't bare to see any more get sick and die. Thank you very much.
 
Last edited:
I'm not an expert by any means, but it sounds like they may be lacking proper nutrition and have some sort of crop issue. The fact that they are digesting their food so poorly that they can pick through their manure speaks pretty loudly. I think I would start by examining them for things like sour crop or possibly some sort of bacteria infection of the crop. I'm curious to see what some of our more experienced members think.
 
Thank you for replying. I have questioned before whether or not they're getting proper nutrition. The food we buy them is extremely expensive. If it were to be sour crop, what kind of changes in their diet could I make? I'm just really worried that it's a horrible disease. If I had the money, I would have a biopsy done on one of our chickens. I'm just not sure what I should do :(
 
I'm new to chickens so I'm not sure if what I found can help. My chicks are sick with respiratory infections, as I was researching I found this link and here is what it said,:

Liver trouble is a non-contagious ailment that affects mostly older, heavier birds in the late winter and early spring. Sometimes the fowls die without warning, or they become sluggish and their faces and combs turn either yellowish or purple. The chickens may also have diarrhea and lose their appetites. The disease is caused by too little exercise and too much heavy, rich feed. It can be prevented by giving the flock a good supply of greens year round. If this disorder does occur, the remedy is a dose of Epsom salts as for diarrhea. Feather pulling is not a disease, but indicates a dietary deficiency which can be remedied by regularly feeding meat and animal scraps to your chickens.

It sounded a lot like what you described.
​
 
YahKheena:

What really shocked me was the white liquid that poured out of the hen's beak when she died. For some reason, I think whatever my chickens have, is contagious. We have never had a problem before with our chickens getting sick. We usually don't have 2 chickens sick at one time. Once one dies, another one gets sick.

We have been feeding our chickens the same food for over 20 years, and have never had a problem before. It's a mix of oats, corn, and laying ration. Extrmely expensive. Is there any other food that you would suggest feeding them for proper health? Would there be a problem with feeding chickens meat becasue of canabilism, or not? And what meat would be best?

I hope and pray that this "disease" or whatever it is will be eliminated after a change in diet. I'm just not sure what the best diet for our chickens would be.

Thank you so so so much for your helpful advice, it's greatly appreciated :)
 
SilkiesnFrizzle: I don't know. Coccidiosis affects younger birds more than older ones, and it's our older ones that are getting sick. In Coccidiosis, they also become "fluffled" up, and this is not the case in my chickens. And bloody poop is another symptom, which my chickens don't have. But your guess is as good as mine. Thanks
 
tmlpike said:
YahKheena: What really shocked me was the white liquid that poured out of the hen's beak when she died. For some reason, I think whatever my chickens have, is contagious. We have never had a problem before with our chickens getting sick. We usually don't have 2 chickens sick at one time. Once one dies, another one gets sick. We have been feeding our chickens the same food for over 20 years, and have never had a problem before. It's a mix of oats, corn, and laying ration. Extrmely expensive. Is there any other food that you would suggest feeding them for proper health? Would there be a problem with feeding chickens meat becasue of canabilism, or not? And what meat would be best? I hope and pray that this "disease" or whatever it is will be eliminated after a change in diet. I'm just not sure what the best diet for our chickens would be. Thank you so so so much for your helpful advice, it's greatly appreciated :)
Click to expand...
Many chickens do that when they die, it's just part of death.

-Kathy
 
tmlpike said:
Anyone who has any knowledge on what they think this may be, please help.

A little background info: We have had chickens for a very long time now, around 20 years. We have an inside area for them as well as a large fenced area outside. After every 2 years, we would get rid of our chickens and get new ones the following spring. However, I have become attached to our chickens, so my parents are letting me keep the ones I've named. They are 3 years old now. We have a mixture of plymouth rock chickens, and brown and white ones. We feed them Mixed Grain and Laying Ration. Our chickens eat each other's poop (the grain in the poop) and they also pluck feathers off each other and then eat them.  

It all started last summer. I noticed one of our chickens who did NOT look healthy. Her tail was droopy, her comb turned purple, and she had her eyes closed. This lasted for for many days. And she stopped eating completely, no matter what we gave her. The ONLY thing she would eat was the buds that would fall of our trees. She lost ALOT of weight, and would sleep standing up. However, she made a full recovery, which shocked me completely. But after a week had gone by she got sick again suddenly and died.

Ever since this has happened, it seems like it keeps on happening to our other chickens. One dies, and another gets sick. We have had about 7 die over 10 months. They all have pretty much the exact same symptoms. Our older chickens get sick most often, but a young one has died too. It must be contagious, because one chicken after another dies.  

SYMPTOMS:
-droopy tail (although not all of them)
-stops eating
-stops laying eggs
-Extremely tired!
-closes eyes all day and sleeps standing up
-looses color in the face
-dramatic weight loss
-diarreha
-every single chicken who was sick has died

We can't have our chickens suffering, so my dad shot the really sick one. When he shot her, white liquid poured out of her mouth! No blood. Very strange!!

Any information would be extremely helpful! I love my chickens so much, and I can't bare to see any more get sick and die. Thank you very much.  
Click to expand...


Hi there,

My flock is showing exactly the same symptoms as this. Did you ever find a solution? I hope all is better with your chickens now, I am very worried about mine :(
 
Even older chickens can get coccidosis if they have been exposed to a strain they have not yet developed immunity too. my guess would be coccidosis. I could be wrong but symptoms are very familiar. Also not all cases of coccidosis involve bloody poo. they can have cocci without bloody poo. you can treat coccidosis with amprolium brand name would be corid or amprol. It kills all 9 strains of the cocci. If you see the symptoms again it would not hurt to treat for coccidosis. If it was my bird this is what I'd do. I really hope this helps. You can Google coccidosis and take a look at the symptoms and you can see it can and does at times strike older birds. Also keep in mind bloody poo does not always have to be present for the bird to have coccidosis. Best of luck.
 

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