Worms! Pls help!

[Kyn Garcia]

I had a hen die a few days ago, I noticed another wasn’t acting like herself the next day.. started looking around inside the coop and found worms in poop. I went to TS and they gave me some medicated pellets. My baby, I love all my hens, but this one is my baby, she thinks she’s my lap dog, she wouldn’t eat any so I read some articles on here found one talking about deworming with horse dewormer, Zimecterin Gold, I put a very tiny pea size, if that smudge on some bread and treated each hen. I’ve also been putting a teaspoon of Apple cider vinegar in water. The day before I treated them I notice another one of my hens was laying soft eggs and yesterday was her 3rd time still laying a soft egg, I added a picture of one of them. I treated them Saturday. I’ve sprinkled DE all through the coop. Ik it’s only been 3 days but I just wanted to get some advice to make sure I didn’t miss anything. I’ve been checking their poop and don’t see and live worms but I guess I’m just wondering how long does it take them to fully shake back from having the worms and start putting their weight back on?

 

[coach723]

What did the worms look like, that you saw?
The correct dosing of Zimectrin Gold is:
Dose is 0.06 ml per pound orally and repeat in 10 days (6 pound bird would get ~0.35 ml).
You need to dose by body weight, and measure with an oral syringe (many feed stores carry them, and most pharmacy's if you ask). Pea sized is very subjective and can result in under dosing. You can also use Safeguard Liquid Goat wormer, which is usually available locally, dosing for that is different.
ACV isn't really going to help with anything, I would just make sure they have fresh, clean water.
If you can identify who is laying the soft shelled eggs, try giving that bird calcium for a few days to see if it helps. If they aren't feeling well, they may not eat well, and could be deficient. A calcium citrate +D once a day orally, 600 mg. Citracal or generic equivalent are usually easy to find in any pharmacy.
What do you feed, including treats? Do you have oyster shell available all the time in a separate feeder? How old are your hens?

 

[Kyn Garcia]

What did the worms look like, that you saw?
The correct dosing of Zimectrin Gold is:
Dose is 0.06 ml per pound orally and repeat in 10 days (6 pound bird would get ~0.35 ml).
You need to dose by body weight, and measure with an oral syringe (many feed stores carry them, and most pharmacy's if you ask). Pea sized is very subjective and can result in under dosing. You can also use Safeguard Liquid Goat wormer, which is usually available locally, dosing for that is different.
ACV isn't really going to help with anything, I would just make sure they have fresh, clean water.
If you can identify who is laying the soft shelled eggs, try giving that bird calcium for a few days to see if it helps. If they aren't feeling well, they may not eat well, and could be deficient. A calcium citrate +D once a day orally, 600 mg. Citracal or generic equivalent are usually easy to find in any pharmacy.
What do you feed, including treats? Do you have oyster shell available all the time in a separate feeder? How old are your hens?

3 of them are a little over 2yrs old and 2 of them are a little over a year old.. so when I seen them the first time they were very thin little dark things moving.. now I just was out there looking through there poop and I seen something moving so I got a pic of it…it’s white.. I feed them Purina Layena Layer Pellets, for treats it could be grapes, apples, blueberries.. all fresh and occasionally I’ll buy mealworms or like the dried vegetables from TS with corn and stuff in it… they were free range for awhile and I noticed they had started eating way less of their feed than when they were only let out in the evening so I gave started containing them in a 100ft fence 2 days before one of them died but I have been making sure they have 2 fresh feeders every day and fresh water.. but before that I was only fixing 1 of the waters daily and the other one I was changing every 2 or 3 but I figured that I was what had happened cause we got a new puppy and the kids sports started so I had kinda neglected doing all the things I was doing before like changing both waters daily and cleaning the coop daily

 

[coach723]

That looks like a maggot in your picture above. I would check all of your birds over, especially around the vent, make sure no one has any wounds or injuries. If flies find a wound they will lay eggs in it, which hatch, and the maggots will feed on the live chicken. That is called fly strike, and it's very serious and can be fatal. Birds with droppings around the vent feathers can have it happen from flies laying eggs in the stuck droppings. This time of year, as it warms up, flying insects are hatching everywhere and population of them is higher. Another possibility, if that was not a real fresh dropping, was some insect laid eggs in the dropping and they hatched there. But I would check every bird, make sure you haven't missed it on someone.

 

[Kyn Garcia]

That maybe what it was, it was poop from that day but it wasn’t poop that I had just watched one of them poop. That’s the only one I seen like that. I weighed all of them yesterday and they are all weighing like 3lbs and Ik for sure my big girl weighed 9lbs last summer. I put some electrolyte and antioxidant supplement in one of their waters this morning. I’m going to spend most of my day outside with them today, I’ll check all their vents and just kinda observe everything. If I get a picture of some fresh poop would yall be able to tell if it looks healthy from a pic? Everything on the internet talks about bringing the poop to the vet but my dog just had to have a procedure done on his nose so I’m not in the financial position to have to pay for anymore vet things for the next month so I’m praying I can get them healthy without having to acquire more vet bills I haven’t seen any more of the frothy looking poop, so I’m hoping that’s a good sign. I’ll weigh them again this afternoon.

 

[coach723]

An occasional frothy, creamy, or sticky poop could just be a cecal dropping. Those come from the cecal pouches, happen about every 10 droppings, and tend to have very different consistency and are often stinkier, than other droppings. But would still be normal. You can search for images for comparison, how they look can be pretty variable depending on what they are eating. Poop pictures are always welcome, and sometimes helpful.
If you dosed correctly with the Zimectrin, and did the second dose at 10 days, then that should take care of any worms. If you didn't dose correctly, or didn't do the follow up dose, then I would worm again.

 

[junipercloud113420]

try mixing red pepper flakes in their food