Dehydrated Hen - PLEASE HELP!

[Tomas Koeck]

Hi there everyone,

During a rush to get to class I had forgotten to take out the plug in my watering apparatus for my hens. Long story short they were without water for a day and a half. I feel like and idiot and still can’t believe I made this mistake.

Fortunately, all but one of the flock is ok. One of my hens is super dehydrated and heat exhausted and I need some advice to those who can help. She was panting, has drooping wings, and weak.

1. 7:00pm Upon finding her, I immediately put her in a dark secluded and cool spot in my basement.
2. Every ten minutes for about an hour I spoon fed her electrolyte water, checked on her and gave her water periodically until 12am
3. Have a fan not too far away on low power to keep air movement
4. 5am this morning I found her worse than before, she was panting heavily with wings drooping and didn’t have any strength.
5. I immediately gave her an emergency bath in cool water, not too cold as I didn’t want to shock her body.
6. She began wheezing but i soon found this was because she was laying an egg. Once the egg was layed she went straight to sleep
7. 8am I came back down and she was conscience! Her eyes are open and she is semi alert and standing and walking (albeit not strong yet)
8. She is now drinking water on her own, clucks in annoyance when I went to pick her up. So good to hear her voice!

Does anyone have any pointers of what to do next?

Thank you,

-Tom

 

[sourland]

sorry for the circumstances. I would continue to keep her in a cooler environment for a couple of days. When you put her back outside, monitor her as she may be more easily heat stressed. Good luck with her.

 

[Tomas Koeck]

Hi there everyone,

During a rush to get to class I had forgotten to take out the plug in my watering apparatus for my hens. Long story short they were without water for a day and a half. I feel like and idiot and still can’t believe I made this mistake.

Fortunately, all but one of the flock is ok. One of my hens is super dehydrated and heat exhausted and I need some advice to those who can help. She was panting, has drooping wings, and weak.

1. 7:00pm Upon finding her, I immediately put her in a dark secluded and cool spot in my basement.
2. Every ten minutes for about an hour I spoon fed her electrolyte water, checked on her and gave her water periodically until 12am
3. Have a fan not too far away on low power to keep air movement
4. 5am this morning I found her worse than before, she was panting heavily with wings drooping and didn’t have any strength.
5. I immediately gave her an emergency bath in cool water, not too cold as I didn’t want to shock her body.
6. She began wheezing but i soon found this was because she was laying an egg. Once the egg was layed she went straight to sleep
7. 8am I came back down and she was conscience! Her eyes are open and she is semi alert and standing and walking (albeit not strong yet)
8. She is now drinking water on her own, clucks in annoyance when I went to pick her up. So good to hear her voice!

Does anyone have any pointers of what to do next?

Thank you,

-Tom

Hello all!

Update: the hen is 100% back to full health, in order to help anyone who may be experiencing this horrific problem I have put a play by play here:

1. 7:00pm I put the hen in a carrier cage and put the cage in our basement which was cool, dark and secluded. I also set up a fan and had a cool water bath in a bucket nearby.
2. Every 10 minutes for one hour I spoon fed the hen water, making sure that the water was getting into her crop. Once she stopped panting I knew she was no longer too hot but was still dehydrated and sick from the heat stroke.
3. After the hour I gave her some alone time, left water and food in her cage just in case.
4. MAKE SURE TO LEAVE THE FAN ON. I made the mistake of turning it off fearing it would scare her. I proceeded to feed her water every 20 minutes, then every thirty until midnight. MAKE SURE TO NOT OVERDO IT.
5. 5:00AM checked on her, hen was panting heavily and very weak and close to death. This is most likely because the fan was turned off. Turned the fan back on, and very SLOWLY, dipped her in the cool water bath to get the temperature back down. Spoon fed her some water again. Make sure to do the bath too fast as this can create shock and kill the hen. Damp cool towels I hear work well as well.
6. Hen proceeded to start wheezing, but this was because she was trying to pass an egg, once she did that (which you should never get involved with), she went to sleep.
7. 8:00AM her body temperature was stable, she started to drink water on her own. She began eating and drinking on her own.
8. Monitored her for the day, made sure she always had food and water.
9. The following day we let her outside with the other chickens early morning when it was cool. When was still a bit weak so after it began to warm up we put her back inside.
10. She showed active signs (clicking, alertness) that told us she was almost ready. After some more monitoring we let her back with her sisters.