Of the 11 three-year-old laying hens I had butchered today, 3 of them had "ascetis", also called water belly, and had to be thrown out. It's not a disease, but is heart failure and hypertension, their liver stops functioning properly and goes bad, and their belly fills up with fluid leaking from the liver, which they can eventually die from after a while.
I want to share this info, since I've been doing some research on it (links below) and it appears to be a common problem with fast-growing meat chickens. Does anyone have info about it in egg-laying hens?
One other guy I talked to, who's has a business butchering chickens for 29 years, said it's become very common for him to see ascetis in "older" laying hens recently due to years of breeding them for high egg production, and that their bodies just get worn out sooner from that. He said I should butcher an egg-layer at 1.5 years old (!) to avoid them having ascetis.
I'd like to know how to treat it, or if it's unavoidable, like some folks said. My hens free-range every day, all day, so I hardly think they have ventilation problems or over-eating problems. Could they have been stressed by winter cold? The only possibility left is I wonder if their water has too much salt in it and gives them hypertension? Could they be getting salt from some other source I'm not thinking of? they roam all over the cow pasture and corn fields. Would salt cause ascetis?
Here is more info: http://www.merckvetmanual.com/mvm/index.jsp?cfile=htm/bc/204601.htm&hide=1
http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$department/deptdocs.nsf/all/pou3546
I want to share this info, since I've been doing some research on it (links below) and it appears to be a common problem with fast-growing meat chickens. Does anyone have info about it in egg-laying hens?
One other guy I talked to, who's has a business butchering chickens for 29 years, said it's become very common for him to see ascetis in "older" laying hens recently due to years of breeding them for high egg production, and that their bodies just get worn out sooner from that. He said I should butcher an egg-layer at 1.5 years old (!) to avoid them having ascetis.
I'd like to know how to treat it, or if it's unavoidable, like some folks said. My hens free-range every day, all day, so I hardly think they have ventilation problems or over-eating problems. Could they have been stressed by winter cold? The only possibility left is I wonder if their water has too much salt in it and gives them hypertension? Could they be getting salt from some other source I'm not thinking of? they roam all over the cow pasture and corn fields. Would salt cause ascetis?
Here is more info: http://www.merckvetmanual.com/mvm/index.jsp?cfile=htm/bc/204601.htm&hide=1
http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$department/deptdocs.nsf/all/pou3546