overeasy-by
Hatching
- Jun 15, 2024
- 2
- 4
- 6
My parents have backyard chickens and they are on a trip right now and asked me to feed and give the chickens water. I came by this morning to feed them and found a chicken plucked basically bald on her back, sides and under her, she was floating in the water bucket with her eyes closed. I thought she was dead but then she opened her eyes and looked around. She did that a few times and when I called my parents they said she is lowest on the pecking order and that the other chickens must have beaten her up and we are guessing she jumped into the bucket to hide but couldn't get herself out. I don't know how long she had been in there, possibly all night. I got her out of the bucket immediately and wrapped her in a towel. There was no blood anywhere, but she is without most of her feathers. My parents said she may have exhausted herself trying to get out of the bucket. I brought her into the house, she slept for hours. I read that warm honey water helps them so I was putting droplets on the side of her beak and she drank them and opened her eyes and looked around for a minute and stretched her legs out and then went back to sleep. I'm so scared she is going to die and I'm not sure what I am supposed to do, my parents can't help much because this hasn't happened before and they're new to this too. She seemed cold so I removed the first towel and put her on a dry one but I read that this may be bad for them because they regulate their own body temperatures and I've also read that it helps keep them calm and warm so I am unsure if that was correct of me. Does she just need rest? Could this kill her and she is just dying slowly? Any advice PLEASE!
