Chickens pecking at other Hens vent

[Eggcessive]

You know this has been going on for what 2 months now? Ascites or egg yolk peritonitis is often a result of the continuous laying of shell-less eggs. You always have seemed to notice when she is struggling to lay or feels awful, then comes the shell-less egg found. You have given the calcium so long, that it probably is not helping. Honestly I probably would have probably given up weeks ago, and put her down, poor thing. I realize that you are fond of her, but it doesn’t look like she is ever going to get better. I am really sorry, Vartain, but I thought that she was dying a couple of weeks ago. The other chickens seem to know that a sick chicken is sick, and they will attack. I have seen it time and again with former flock leaders and even roosters who were felt to be ill. It would be good, if you can manage it to do a necropsy when she does die, just to see what was going on.

 

[vantain]

You know this has been going on for what 2 months now? Ascites or egg yolk peritonitis is often a result of the continuous laying of shell-less eggs. You always have seemed to notice when she is struggling to lay or feels awful, then comes the shell-less egg found. You have given the calcium so long, that it probably is not helping. Honestly I probably would have probably given up weeks ago, and put her down, poor thing. I realize that you are fond of her, but it doesn’t look like she is ever going to get better. I am really sorry, Vartain, but I thought that she was dying a couple of weeks ago. The other chickens seem to know that a sick chicken is sick, and they will attack. I have seen it time and again with former flock leaders and even roosters who were felt to be ill. It would be good, if you can manage it to do a necropsy when she does die, just to see what was going on.

She has actually had a few good days here. The pick-no-more stopped the pecking, and I think the bath I gave her helped as well. She was doing normal chicken things today. As far as the laying is concerned, I do think she is doing that internally. I am going to stop the added calcium though, as that does not seem to be helping.

Since she is doing ok, and behaving mostly normal, I’m going to let her live out her remaining days with her flock mates. If something changes, and she really starts to go downhill, or is being aggressively picked on by the others, then I will likely end it.

For now, she is eating, drinking, scratching, roosting, pecking...etc...with the others, and just has a couple of days a week (really just a few hours of her day) where she seems a bit miserable, until she either expels the egg mass, or does it internally.

 

[vantain]

Here she is on roost tonight. She is the one on the far left.