Chicken Lovers please HELP! Please endure this long post for my son’s sake, it’s his hen.

[Mommarobinette]

Hey my lovely group of chicken keepers and life savers! I have some questions:

(Giving a history of what’s been going on for three days first for context and reference)

I’ve been dealing with a sick hen since Wednesday. We dewormed flock with safeguard goat dewormer 10% according to weight for all worms on Monday.
Said hen wouldn’t get up to leave coop Wednesday and didn’t want to drink or eat. Was walking a little funny and noticed diarrhea that ranged from clear and a mustard yellow (but a little lighter), mixed with clear and white and sometimes green and yellow or just clear and white. She segregated herself from the rest of the flock. Just wanted to lay in the corner. And kept falling asleep all day.
Thursday I noticed the same thing so I reached out for some help. With all of the information I was given, I decided soak in epsom salts and feel around. I also gave her vitamin D and TUMs crushed up directly into beak, soaked layer feed in cold water and helped/force fed and gave her the water from it. I also scrambled an egg and gave that to her and she willingly ate about 5 bites.
After all of this I had checked her thoroughly for mites/lice or stuck eggs. Nothing. Noticed she was super skinny and bony. It’s been 100 degrees all week and the entire flock was panting and held wings away from body so I dunked them in our kiddie pool that’s available to them with bricks for them to cool off through feet (but they never use for that, they just drink from it).

I prayed and prayed that she would make it through the night.
She made it! So Friday she came out of coop and went to the big water jug we have (they free range and I change it daily), and drank a bunch of water. Still didn’t eat. I tried to offer her everything I could think of. She wasn’t interested. I gave her more vitamins and force fed her new much later feed soaked in water. She didn’t eat any but drank the water from it with my forced help.

So now we are in the present. It’s Saturday and she’s walking around some more and acting like she’s hunting for crickets or bugs in the backyard, but not wanting to eat or drink.

Do I continue the vitamins?

I forgot to mention that I decided to dose her 350 mgs of amoxicillin (powder form) yesterday just to try to see if that helped because of the diarrhea. I didn’t want to risk a bacterial infection if that might have been it.
She still has diarrhea and doesn’t want to eat.
I put electrolytes in the water for everyone because the heat.
What else can I do that DOES NOT cost any more money. I can’t take to vet or send in sample. I have five kids to feed. What can I do for her? She’s SO skinny.

 

[Rose the Legbar]

@Wyorp Rock @Eggcessive

 

[HollowOfWisps]

It’s most likely an overload of worms. When parasites die off in a body they release a toxin. This toxin can cause flu like symptoms including diarrhea, other gastric disturbances, lethargy, poor appetite etc. When this happens it is called a Herxheimer reaction. If she is up and about now trying to forage she is getting something in her. A chicken that hasn’t eaten in 2 days would be extremely lethargic. If she is only eating bugs in the grass that is fine at this point I wouldn’t force feed her if she is mobile and showing progress. Parasites can cause an imbalance of gut bacteria so I always give a probiotic after worming. Antibiotics will kill both the good and bad bacteria so she had has a double whammy on the gut front. That is why she still has diarrhea. Over treating with multiple medications within a short amount of time can do more damage than good. After both the wormer and antibiotics I would dose her with a good probiotic for the next week or two.

 

[Mommarobinette]

It’s most likely an overload of worms. When parasites die off in a body they release a toxin. This toxin can cause flu like symptoms including diarrhea, other gastric disturbances, lethargy, poor appetite etc. When this happens it is called a Herxheimer reaction. If she is up and about now trying to forage she is getting something in her. A chicken that hasn’t eaten in 2 days would be extremely lethargic. If she is only eating bugs in the grass that is fine at this point I wouldn’t force feed her if she is mobile and showing progress. Parasites can cause an imbalance of gut bacteria so I always give a probiotic after worming. Antibiotics will kill both the good and bad bacteria so she had has a double whammy on the gut front. That is why she still has diarrhea. Over treating with multiple medications within a short amount of time can do more damage than good. After both the wormer and antibiotics I would dose her with a good probiotic for the next week or two.

Thank you so much! What probiotic do you recommend? Preferably very cheap since I’m broke from chicken tending.
Also, in my last attempt to get her to eat, I remembered that we breed dubia roaches for our bearded dragons. I gave her some and she finally ate for me