Hens in the hall

[wyoDreamer]

Be careful with cutting grass for the chickens. My favorite chicken died from a sour crop - when I autopsied her I found out she had eaten too much grass clippings and it had tangled up into a ball and clogged up her crop. When chickens eat grass, they snap off little pieces of the top of the blade of grass, they cannot chew an entire blade of grass down like a cow or goat can. I think a small amount is OK, but I don't know how much is too much. Better to be cautious than not, I think.

 

[Wyorp Rock]

Hens looking a lot happier now. The smaller, less injured hen is cucuing, noisily, all the time. If she gets a chance for her favourite treat of pure cooked beef hamburger, chopped into little pieces, she squeals with delight and will even take it out of the other birds beak. She only gets a little. I cook the hamburgers, chop them up, make up little pouches and pop them in the freezer.
The larger bird however is causing me more concern. I think her stomach hasn’t recovered from all the antibiotics she had. It’s very much a liquid squirt. She’s also making some of the brown foul smelling stuff now. I tried to mix the treats she likes with some yogurt but she refused to touch it. She does eat the pellets but only from the floor, not the container. What she does like is new season grass and small dandelion leaves. So far I cut three small bowls worth and she’s cleared the lot. I’m hoping that she’s eating what she thinks will be good for her. Is this ok?

Do you have a photo of her poop?

I'm glad to hear the smaller hen is getting along fine.

For the bigger one, check her crop to see if it empties overnight. It could be that her system is still adjusting from the antibiotics. Chickens do have 2 types of poop. One is "normal" usually firm with a white cap (urates) the other is a "cecal poop" this is a looser, stinky, sticky poop - chicken has a cecal poop about 1 out of every 8-10 normal poops.

I don't see any harm in fresh grass and dandelion (you may want to chop them up), just make sure you have a source of poultry grit (crushed granite) available, so they can process the foods. Some chickens when they have been ill, seem to want fresh green stuffs. She may also like some fresh chopped kale if you have any - mine love kale no matter what.

 

[wyoDreamer]

I still offer greens to my chickens, even after my hen died. However, I am now careful to limit them on GRASS. It is so easy for long blades of grass to tangle and bind up in the crop and never make it to the gizzard to be ground up.
Maybe put the greens in a mesh sack (like for oranges, onions or grapefruit from the store), so the chickens can peck at it and get smaller pieces, I don't know.
I did take a spare piece of fencing and made a "Hay Rack" for offering them overgrown weeds. the fencing I used for the run is a mesh with 2" x 4" openings. the scrap is about 12" tall and 18" wide and I hung it on outside of the welded wire fencing for their run. The bottom edge has the wire twisted onto the run so it acts like a hinge. the top wires are slid into the run fencing to keep it closed. All I do is lay the weeds down on the scrap fence and then hinge it up and voila, the weeds are held against the run for the chickens to peck at. They really enjoy picking at the leaves and seed heads on the weeds and at the end of the day, all the salks that are left go onto the compost pile. My chickens have to be locked in the run all day while we are gone.

 

[SW31]

Thank you for advice. They seem fine this morning but larger bird still has very, very watery poo. I’ve made some scrambled egg for them but neither of them is interested in it. They are both happily scrambling in the straw looking for pellets and seed mixture. I will go out later, pick some dandelion leaves and cut them up small for them, no grass I think after comments above. I have to see the vet this afternoon so will ask for something for the poo problem.

 

[SW31]

The little bird is making the cecal poop but I don’t think the larger one is. Sometimes her watery poo though is very smelly. Sorry, I keep cleaning the floors after each poo so forget to take picture first. I would hate to lose her after all the work we have all done.

 

[Soon2BChixMom]

I wonder if you could sprinkle probiotics onto their food to help the bigger one with her gut flora? We do that for our dogs. We just give human grade - reading the label of course.

 

[SW31]

Thank you re probiotics. See picture below re watery poo. It looks like the grass she’s eaten over two days has gone straight through her, which explains why she so hungry when given something she likes. She wolfs it down, but she’s a picky eater otherwise. Will speak to vet as I’m not sure about different probiotics in France.

 

[SW31]

Just back from vets. She said grass is on the acidic side and can aggravate stomach problems. She advised to stay away from any more antibiotics given how much they’ve already had. She provided them so probiotic capsules and for the larger bird a liquid that you inject into the mouth to calm and settle the stomach. Both for five days. The smaller bird had no problems with the capsule. It went down in a flash.
The larger bird was a nightmare. No way was she taking the capsule or the oral medication. Fortunately she loves ham so I put the oral medication first on the ham, no problem. I took the probiotic stuff out of the capsule. It’s not wet but not completely dry either. I ground it up and mixed it with more ham, didn’t work as well as I would like. Tomorrow I think I’ll grind it up again, then add the oral liquid and then mix in some ham pieces and give it to her when I think she will be hungry. She still passing a lot of clear liquid, mostly with some grass in it and one liquid cecal poo as well.
Other than that, they are healing well, feathers are growing back and they are both scavaging in the straw.
Neighbour will soon get 700€ vet bill plus several hundred for Omlet run needed for two months. Very stressful.

 

[SW31]

Nightmare getting new medication into poorly chicken. She’s now lost a lot of weight. Little one, eats the probiotic capsule and anything else going. The other one, who really needs this stuff, first turned her nose up.
In the end, I put a little water in and mixed it all up well - probiotic, stomach settler and ham. I got the small one back into the run, laid on the floor and fed first unadulterated ham, then the unadulterated ham plus a little of the medicine covered ham underneath it and then finally just the medicine covered ham. The small hen, now full of food, was happy kicking the straw about to find the food pellets so she stopped distracting the other hen!
It all went but I was concerned there was a bit of liquid left in the bottom of the dish that had the drugs in it. I kept slowly adding grated emmental cheese as she kept eating it until most of the liquid was gone.

 

[Wyorp Rock]

It may be easier to mix the meds with a little water and syringe it into her - this shows you how. See if the vet can provide some syringes or sometimes feed or pet stores have them as well (they do in the US)
https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/safely-administering-oral-medications-to-poultry.73335/

Ham is o.k. as a treat, but I would try to limit it, because of the salt content. Cheese too (because of salt). I do understand that you are doing everything you can to get her going, so if that's the only way to get the meds in then keep it up

I hope your bigger girl starts to improve, I'm happy to hear the little one is doing well.