Decrease of Appetite- 3 yr old BSL

[mrskenmore]

4/3/17 5:00 PM EST UPDATE:

So today was take Jolene to the vet day. I took her to an extremely knowledgeable avian vet in my area that used to have a chicken in the office as a pet! They were great with her, everyone in the office loved having a chicken around. They did an exam and said her heart sounded healthy, her vitals were good but she seemed to have a lot of fluid in her abdomen. I left her there for the day and went home to wait for the call. Around 1:30 pm they gave me a call saying she was ready to be picked up and that they had drained her of 300 cc's of fluid- which equals 1.25 cups or 10 fluid ounces! (that is almost a full can of soda!) They said that she was acting great and was eating mealworms and drinking water. They did a sonogram on her stomach and did blood work and a fecal test. The fluid that they removed from her was a clear/yellow fluid and was also sent out to the lab for testing. I was very happy with my vet experience and I was very glad I took her today. I was fortunate enough to be able to find a local vet that understands that sometimes chickens are pets and sometimes we care about them a lot. I brought her home this afternoon and fed her a hard boiled egg with layer mash and raisins. She is also on a 1/4 tablet of lasix twice a day that I hide in a raisin. She has been drinking and acting more alert. I hope now that she is back with her sisters, well fed and has 10 fl ounces of fluid out of her that she can continue to heal and get back to life as a chicken. I will continue to post on her progress and updates as I learn more. For now I just want to continue to update all that may be following along with Jolene's story or maybe reading this to learn more about their problems to get answers.

Thanks for your support!

 

[Wyorp Rock]

I'm glad you were able to find a vet for her. That was a lot of fluid that they drained, I bet she is more comfortable now.

Please do keep us posted on how Jolene is, the information you post is always helpful to others. I hope she starts to feel better.

 

[mrskenmore]

4/4/17 1:00 PM EST UPDATE

Got a call back from the vet today and her kidneys and liver look great, also results came back negative on the fecal samples. The fluid they drained out of her won't have results for another couple of days. For now I am hopeful that she is more comfortable- she has been perching today- which she loves and hasn't been able to do for several weeks now and she looks much better. I know that fluid retention in hens is not normal, and we probably have a long road ahead of us with decisions to make, but for today she is happy and knowing that makes me happy.

Thanks for the support!

 

[mrskenmore]

4/12/17 6:00 AM EST UPDATE

So Jolene needed to go back to the vet yesterday to be drained, the vet took 500 cc's (16 fl oz) of fluid out of her. The test results finally came back from the pathologist and she has no bacterial, no infection and no cancer. The vet thought that she would be a good candidate for a hormone implant. Seeing that she is otherwise healthy I agreed that it was worth a shot, so yesterday she received her implant that should hopefully last for 12 months and start making her feel better. The implant works by a slow dose of hormones into the systems which will cause her not to lay and should give her a nice well deserved rest from her reproductive system. The implant was called (Deslorelin) Suprelorin implant and was founded for use in ferrets with successful use in hens with reproductive issues. There are several links on it on backyard chickens, but seems more popular in the UK and Australia than in the US. If anyone has any experience with this please let me know as I hope she starts to feel better real soon! I have included the link to the thread as well as another useful article below.

Thanks!

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/...tops-hens-with-egg-peritonitis-laying-anymore

https://poultrykeeper.com/reproductive-system-problems/suprelorin-implant-for-chickens/

 

[Wyorp Rock]

Thank you for the update!

I hope the implant works well for her.

 

[mrskenmore]

4/17/17 8:00 AM EST UPDATE

It is with a heavy heart that I must say that this story ends here. Jolene fought up until the end and slowly gave up this past Saturday morning when she passed away in the nesting box, accompanied by her EE pal- Arianna Huffington. It was such an act of kindness that she had her bestie with her up until the end. My husband and I had both checked on Jolene early in the morning and she was very quiet and listless, but still alive. It was then that Arianna decided to sit next to her for the next hour or so. I looked out into the coop a bit later in the morning just as Arianna left to go out into the run to meet up with our third hen. I knew exactly at that moment that Jolene was gone. I went out there to check and sure enough she had passed away peacefully in her home surrounded by her sisters and her family that loved her so much. She passed away from Egg Yolk Peritonitis and I realize now that there is nothing that we could have done for her sadly. We tried everything and it was just her time to go. She passed just shy of her third birthday which is at the end of this month. The past few weeks have been incredibly sad and exhausting for my husband and I as I sometimes believe losing a pet is one of the hardest things that one may have to go through. That being said, In the three years that she lived with us she enriched our lives and made us laugh every minute of every day. She was a loud, fierce, friendly black sex link hen that we adopted from a feed store in New Hampshire. She was the first hen to go in the box of the three total we purchased that day and peeped all the way home to NY in a five hour car ride! She winded up being a bold flock leader that was kind, fair and beautiful. I will miss her dearly as the house and yard are infinitely more quiet and serene. Her sisters seem to miss her as well as there are only two of them now, but we just recently purchased more day old chicks a month ago that will join them in about a months time to liven things up in the coop again. I love all of my girls and are thankful for each waking moment I spend with them. Everytime that they lay eggs I thank them, and every morning I greet them with an I love you and a have a nice day! At night they get tucked in with an I love you and sleep tight. Chickens are remarkable animals in more ways than one, while sad that I won't have another day with Jolene in the coop, she is forever loved in my heart.

I hope all of you reading this hug your chickens today- because they can teach a human a thing or two about compassion, strength and love.

 

[mrskenmore]

Attaching one of my favorite photos of her in my husbands arms last spring- she was his favorite hen and he her favorite too!

 

[Wyorp Rock]

I'm so sorry.

Thank you for sharing the photo and story of Jolene, she was lovely and I'm sure she will always hold a special place in your heart.

I hope your new babies and the remaining 2 hens do well.