Difficulty diagnosing loss of eggs production caused by disease or season

[wleighton]

Hi all,

I'm a new chicken owner, purchased my 5 female cream crested legbar chicks in March. They free range in our lawn and garden during the day. The start of my problems began when the neighbors dog got loose and attacked two of our chickens in early September. We brought them the the vet who stitched them up and prescribed baytril for two weeks. Now, prior to the attack we had three of the 5 hens laying. We quarantined the two hens and reintroduced them a week later. We abstained from eating any eggs for three weeks after. During this time, they started to develop what appeared to be dry pox. We had a busy fall with two weddings so I was unable to keep a close eye on them myself, and relied on friends to feed and water them. In October the neighbor's ducks got loose and started terrorizing our chickens for three weeks until the neighbors rebuilt their outdoor pen. The ducks would break into our coop, eat all their food and soil our chickens water. It was a huge pain, and I know our hens were stressed and not pleased they they had to be kept in the run. Now in November, all of our hens have pox (or what appears to be) and have virtually stopped laying. Their combs are shrunken and discolored, but they are full of energy. I feed them organic layer feed with DE, clean their coop weekly and dust with DE, ACV in water, scrambled eggs with organic yogurt (1x week or daily for a week - depending on how many raised eyebrows my husband throws my way) and wood stove ash in the run for bathing. Their poop looks very healthy as well, but they may have lost some weight and no longer squat. We also live in vt and had our first snowfall last week but has subsequently melted. Lastly, they seem to be loosing feathers around their neck, whether by one of the other's pecks or moulting.

I've attached some pictures, but I'm really hoping someone can offer some advice. Like I said, I'm a newb, so any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Here are some of our girls (you can tell they think the camera is food)

 

[chickengr]

Hi all,

I'm a new chicken owner, purchased my 5 female cream crested legbar chicks in March. They free range in our lawn and garden during the day. The start of my problems began when the neighbors dog got loose and attacked two of our chickens in early September. We brought them the the vet who stitched them up and prescribed baytril for two weeks. Now, prior to the attack we had three of the 5 hens laying. We quarantined the two hens and reintroduced them a week later. We abstained from eating any eggs for three weeks after. During this time, they started to develop what appeared to be dry pox. We had a busy fall with two weddings so I was unable to keep a close eye on them myself, and relied on friends to feed and water them. In October the neighbor's ducks got loose and started terrorizing our chickens for three weeks until the neighbors rebuilt their outdoor pen. The ducks would break into our coop, eat all their food and soil our chickens water. It was a huge pain, and I know our hens were stressed and not pleased they they had to be kept in the run. Now in November, all of our hens have pox (or what appears to be) and have virtually stopped laying. Their combs are shrunken and discolored, but they are full of energy. I feed them organic layer feed with DE, clean their coop weekly and dust with DE, ACV in water, scrambled eggs with organic yogurt (1x week or daily for a week - depending on how many raised eyebrows my husband throws my way) and wood stove ash in the run for bathing. Their poop looks very healthy as well, but they may have lost some weight and no longer squat. We also live in vt and had our first snowfall last week but has subsequently melted. Lastly, they seem to be loosing feathers around their neck, whether by one of the other's pecks or moulting.

I've attached some pictures, but I'm really hoping someone can offer some advice. Like I said, I'm a newb, so any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Here are some of our girls (you can tell they think the camera is food)

nice girls!

when my hens had pox last year they stopped laying and lost some weight. a month ago 2 chicks of mine got pox as well and I gave them some black peppercorns. it helped them and they didn't loose any weight.

 

[wleighton]

Thanks! I'm still not 100% sure that it's fowl pox. And if it is, they've had it for a really long time, since beginning of October. Did the peppercorns help them get over it as well or mostly with just the weight loss prevention?

Thanks!

 

[chickengr]

Thanks! I'm still not 100% sure that it's fowl pox. And if it is, they've had it for a really long time, since beginning of October. Did the peppercorns help them get over it as well or mostly with just the weight loss prevention?

Thanks!

my chicks already had some scabs when I found out about peppercorns.

I had fowl pox in my flock last year, august - december at least, maybe longer. they didn't get it at the same time.

 

[wleighton]

Thanks Chickengr! That's encouraging to hear. A lot of posts say 3-6 weeks for recovery, and I was getting pretty discouraged, wondering what I was doing wrong.