Anyone know of a good poultry injury, health and care book on amazon?

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Themellowyellows

Themellowyellows

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Hi! Just had two chickens die, and wonder if I can do anything to have prevented/help them, it broke my heart losing two in a small time so anyone know of a good "Chicken aid" book found on Amazon? Does it help? Thanks all!
 
Aside from coming to this forum, The Chicken Health Handbook, by Gail Damerow is my go-to.

20240626_080159.jpg
 
Chickens are not generally real long lived. Sometimes I think that very sensitive people should not have chickens because they feel so bad when they die. On the other hand, I think sometimes people have chickens so they can doctor something.

Really I have found over the decades it is common to loose chicks in the first few days. It happens. It is a genetic malfunction of the chick and they call it failure to thrive.

Then next time I will have a tendency for one to die, is around 6 weeks. Last year, I bought, and CHECKED to make sure they were symmetrical, especially in the beak area. Around 5 weeks, I thought the chick had a stick stuck in her beak, and it turns out it was a cross beak. The thing with a cross beak, not only is the feeding an issue, there is often are other genetic issues that are not really apparent and they often die very young.

Then right at maturity just before egg laying, not often, a perfectly fine hen, absolutely bright eyed and active will be found dead. It is almost hard to believe. She seemed to go from being very alive to very dead in a moment. Often times you will find these under the roost. A wise old woman who had had chickens for years told me that it is called sudden death, and she always thought it was a heart attack. Once I had a group of flock mates in which one died once a month for three months. I was getting concerned, what was I doing wrong? I have not had another one in 14 years. It had to be a genetic malformation of those flock mates.

But then you seem to stabilize, the ones alive generally are good to go for 3-5 years, before old age gets them.

"My God" you must be thinking, how do chickens live? These are pretty rare occurrences, once in while these things happen. But they do happen and people feel guilty about what is not in their control and have unreasonable expectations for the lifespan of chickens. Can you get really old chickens? Yes, you can. Can you loose chickens way before that? Yes you can. And really unless your birds are being grossly uncared for, neither example is your fault, but rather a luck of the draw.

Adequate protection, good food, clean water is really what you can do. Do that and be realistic that you are not going to save them all.

Mrs K
 
Mrs. K said:
Chickens are not generally real long lived. Sometimes I think that very sensitive people should not have chickens because they feel so bad when they die. On the other hand, I think sometimes people have chickens so they can doctor something.

Really I have found over the decades it is common to loose chicks in the first few days. It happens. It is a genetic malfunction of the chick and they call it failure to thrive.

Then next time I will have a tendency for one to die, is around 6 weeks. Last year, I bought, and CHECKED to make sure they were symmetrical, especially in the beak area. Around 5 weeks, I thought the chick had a stick stuck in her beak, and it turns out it was a cross beak. The thing with a cross beak, not only is the feeding an issue, there is often are other genetic issues that are not really apparent and they often die very young.

Then right at maturity just before egg laying, not often, a perfectly fine hen, absolutely bright eyed and active will be found dead. It is almost hard to believe. She seemed to go from being very alive to very dead in a moment. Often times you will find these under the roost. A wise old woman who had had chickens for years told me that it is called sudden death, and she always thought it was a heart attack. Once I had a group of flock mates in which one died once a month for three months. I was getting concerned, what was I doing wrong? I have not had another one in 14 years. It had to be a genetic malformation of those flock mates.

But then you seem to stabilize, the ones alive generally are good to go for 3-5 years, before old age gets them.

"My God" you must be thinking, how do chickens live? These are pretty rare occurrences, once in while these things happen. But they do happen and people feel guilty about what is not in their control and have unreasonable expectations for the lifespan of chickens. Can you get really old chickens? Yes, you can. Can you loose chickens way before that? Yes you can. And really unless your birds are being grossly uncared for, neither example is your fault, but rather a luck of the draw.

Adequate protection, good food, clean water is really what you can do. Do that and be realistic that you are not going to save them all.

Mrs K
Click to expand...
Excellent post Mrs K.
I applaud your realistic approach
Deborah
 
Mrs. K said:
Chickens are not generally real long lived. Sometimes I think that very sensitive people should not have chickens because they feel so bad when they die. On the other hand, I think sometimes people have chickens so they can doctor something.

Really I have found over the decades it is common to loose chicks in the first few days. It happens. It is a genetic malfunction of the chick and they call it failure to thrive.

Then next time I will have a tendency for one to die, is around 6 weeks. Last year, I bought, and CHECKED to make sure they were symmetrical, especially in the beak area. Around 5 weeks, I thought the chick had a stick stuck in her beak, and it turns out it was a cross beak. The thing with a cross beak, not only is the feeding an issue, there is often are other genetic issues that are not really apparent and they often die very young.

Then right at maturity just before egg laying, not often, a perfectly fine hen, absolutely bright eyed and active will be found dead. It is almost hard to believe. She seemed to go from being very alive to very dead in a moment. Often times you will find these under the roost. A wise old woman who had had chickens for years told me that it is called sudden death, and she always thought it was a heart attack. Once I had a group of flock mates in which one died once a month for three months. I was getting concerned, what was I doing wrong? I have not had another one in 14 years. It had to be a genetic malformation of those flock mates.

But then you seem to stabilize, the ones alive generally are good to go for 3-5 years, before old age gets them.

"My God" you must be thinking, how do chickens live? These are pretty rare occurrences, once in while these things happen. But they do happen and people feel guilty about what is not in their control and have unreasonable expectations for the lifespan of chickens. Can you get really old chickens? Yes, you can. Can you loose chickens way before that? Yes you can. And really unless your birds are being grossly uncared for, neither example is your fault, but rather a luck of the draw.

Adequate protection, good food, clean water is really what you can do. Do that and be realistic that you are not going to save them all.

Mrs K
Click to expand...
I get that- but I want to know I tried, there my pets.
 
Themellowyellows said:
I get that- but I want to know I tried, there my pets.
Click to expand...
There's definitely nothing wrong with that. Everyone here has their own chicken-keeping philosophy - it's all good (as long as cruelty isn't involved).

If you happen to have mysterious deaths and you REALLY want to know what caused it, the only sure way to do that is send the body to a lab for necropsy.

This article has a list of labs by state:

https://www.heritageacresmarket.com/poultry-necropsy-labs/#:~:text=Consider sending the bird to,lab, special preparation is necessary.
 

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