Houdini56
Chirping
One of my 2-1/2 year old Golden Comet hens has become ill pretty much overnight. Fine yesterday, eating, scratching, socializing
during their supervised free range time. Today, came out with the other two but seemed dazed and in slow motion. Got to my chair
and just stood there, almost nonresponsive. She's the friendliest of the group and interacts a lot with me. Her name is Patience.
I put her in the hen house by herself and offered yogurt and some water with a bit of yogurt in it. She did take a few bites of yogurt and
took some sips of water...but basically sat herself down, not moving much at all. Her butt feathers were a bit messy with poo but not the
worst I've ever seen....still, we got some warm water with mild soap and took a look at her vent. It is clean appearing and it's usual fleshy
color. There was obviously wet poo on the back feathers so she is still putting it out. I trimmed her feathers and put her in the chicken
tractor for some quiet time.
The other thing that may be pertinent is they are in what we call a mini-molt.....some chicken feathers are laying around for the last week,
and when we usually get 1-3 eggs a day with 2 being average, we have only had one egg a day for the last 3 days. These hens don't ever seem
to have the type of significant molt I expected, just go through these times where they get a bit scraggly looking and it never lasts too
long. Egg production usually goes down at the same time. I assume this is just the way it is with hybrids.
I palpated very gently around her vent and didn't get any sense of an egg. She didn't seem particularly bothered by me doing it. I know
they can get egg-bound, but really don't know a lot else about it.
I'm not sure what else to look for or what I can do for her. I was hoping that washing her vent would perk her up, but she was pretty
much the same when I put her in the tractor afterwards.
Patience and I would appreciate hearing your thoughts or suggestions. Thank you!!
during their supervised free range time. Today, came out with the other two but seemed dazed and in slow motion. Got to my chair
and just stood there, almost nonresponsive. She's the friendliest of the group and interacts a lot with me. Her name is Patience.
I put her in the hen house by herself and offered yogurt and some water with a bit of yogurt in it. She did take a few bites of yogurt and
took some sips of water...but basically sat herself down, not moving much at all. Her butt feathers were a bit messy with poo but not the
worst I've ever seen....still, we got some warm water with mild soap and took a look at her vent. It is clean appearing and it's usual fleshy
color. There was obviously wet poo on the back feathers so she is still putting it out. I trimmed her feathers and put her in the chicken
tractor for some quiet time.
The other thing that may be pertinent is they are in what we call a mini-molt.....some chicken feathers are laying around for the last week,
and when we usually get 1-3 eggs a day with 2 being average, we have only had one egg a day for the last 3 days. These hens don't ever seem
to have the type of significant molt I expected, just go through these times where they get a bit scraggly looking and it never lasts too
long. Egg production usually goes down at the same time. I assume this is just the way it is with hybrids.
I palpated very gently around her vent and didn't get any sense of an egg. She didn't seem particularly bothered by me doing it. I know
they can get egg-bound, but really don't know a lot else about it.
I'm not sure what else to look for or what I can do for her. I was hoping that washing her vent would perk her up, but she was pretty
much the same when I put her in the tractor afterwards.
Patience and I would appreciate hearing your thoughts or suggestions. Thank you!!