sudden death

We had a lone 1 or 2 day old Rouen duckling come into the rescue centre. Which is strange because it’s winter here in SA. Rouen ducks are not indigenous her in South Africa, so this little one could not be released. We decided to keep her and buy another duckling as a companion. Because it is...

Hi all! I need a de-wormer ASAP. Our flock definitely has parasites of some kind as two have died in the past week after making wheezing noises and shaking their heads and necks. Gapeworm?? Any Canadians here that can recommend a brand to try for treating our entire flock? We’re in Ontario...

Hi everyone, One of my hens is suddenly wheezing. She makes an inhale wheeze and then shakes her head a bit. The head shaking doesn’t happen with every breath, but often enough that it is worrisome. Her sister died suddenly about 1.5 weeks ago. Just curled up in a corner to “rest” and was dead...

I swapped out an old dish waterer for a nipple setup for my chickens about a week ago. They are 5 month old Black Australorpes and are just starting to lay. After taking the old waterer dish away, I left it in the sun and did not clean it for about a week (lazy, I know!) as I planned to throw...

Hey all. Just 20 minutes ago I walked outside mid-day to all of my flocks alarm calling. I quickly ended up finding one of my bachelor flock boys, a 2 year also Buff Orpington rooster, dead on his back, with blood flowing from his mouth. I immediately went to see what happened and couldn't find...

Our sapphire gem died suddenly today. She was fine in the morning and laid a normal egg. Four hours later she was on the ground in the run, still warm with no injuries. It felt like she had small rocks in her crop. I am going to contact our vet Monday to see about a necropsy. I’m wondering if...

Well, it’s been a weird day. I had two chicks hatch (yay) but one of my older pullets randomly died. I wanted to reach out to see if anyone might have an idea of what happened or if they’ve had this happen themselves. All my 7 month old chickens were out free ranging as they normally do, and I...

hello all. it is a solemn day on our backyard homestead as our most beloved and special gal, a bantam blue silkie hen, has suddenly passed. there’s kind of a long backstory, so here it is: she lived on her own for a few months and we added 4 silkie bantam pullets in july. living on her own for...

Im not sure if this is the correct forum but I wasn’t sure where else to post it other than ’ducks.’ I’m going to try and go into detail about what happened. I have 13 ducks of various breeds, 6 of which are muscovies. 2 males and 4 females, they are our only male ducks. All my ducks are about...

Hi All, 3 weeks ago I came home from a weekend away to find one of my Orpington pullets (26 weeks) dead in the coop. She was in top health (beautiful, big, show-quality bird) and there were no signs of a struggle. This morning, I found her sister in the same position. This chook was also in top...

Hi there! I had 9 duck eggs incubating. 8 of them had hatched as of Saturday night (2 minimally assisted, 6 hatched completely unassisted). It is now Monday night, and 4 of those ducklings have died. 2 deaths were the 2 assists, and I can understand why they may have died. The other 2 were the...

Hello, yesterday morning I had checked on my flock of 5 chickens and all appeared well and healthy. It was then later that night when I put them to bed I noticed one was showing signs of clear illness. I have lost many chickens for the short amount of time I have kept them (4 years), most for...

My 1 yr old white rock(dominant hen) suddenly started breathing heavy and acting lethargic out of nowhere. Her tail was down and her comb is very pale. She does not feel egg bound. I checked her feathers for mites. She was literally fine 10 minutes before this eating scratch and what not. One...

Woke up this morning to let the chickens out and everyone woke up & was acting normal as always and then I went back to bed for about 3 hours to notice my 2 year old ee hen [a month from 3] laying dead in the run. Overall she was healthy, wasn't over weight, never had any worms or anything, no...

So for about a year I’ve been raising Muscovy and chickens. This past week stranger things have been happening. 🙃. I have had no issues, no deaths until now. One, two, three. Three male Muscovy are now deseased. I have been racking my brain trying to figure out how. I have two ideas that I...

This is Gertrude. About a week old. She was our biggest, healthiest, happiest chick. A couple days ago she started her distress chirp. I went to her and she was not ok. She died within an hour. She was panting, gasping and obviously in distress. She was limp, in and out of consciousness, hard...

Hello. I adopted last Friday two Ayam Cemani 8 week old pullets. They were doing okay but two days ago they started to act a bit strange, they were eating and drinking but one specially was constatly fluffed up with her head close to her body, but still moving around. She was dead this morning...

Yesterday morning when I went out to my chicken's coop I found one of them laying on the floor. I picked her up and she was breathing with her mouth slightly open and her crop was very large and squishy, it felt like it was filled with fluid or gas. I thought she might have sour crop and I had...

I've been wondering why my sick quails seem much better after proper care, then suddenly they die. This happened a few months ago when a one year old quail seemed lethargic so I brought her inside, and she seemed to be recovering, then suddenly she passed away. Then a few days ago, I noticed...

This is one of my favorite hens, Pirate. She is three years old. My youngest one since the rest of the flock is all seven years for the most part. This morning I found her roosting in the coop. She didn’t come out even when I shook mealworms. When I showed her mealworms she ate them though...