Egg Bound/Broody/Something else?

[Brigwy]

Thanks for your help!

I have a chicken - just under 9 months old - that was taking a really long time in her nesting box. I didn't think anything of it at first. Sometimes some of my chickens will take hours to lay. Eventually, in the afternoon, I saw her walking around outside, and I went out and collected a warm egg. Later in the day, it started getting dusk, so I went out to see if they had all went in for the night so I could lock the coop, and the chicken in question was the only one inside at this point. I peeked into the coop, and sure enough, she was back in her nest. I started worrying about egg-bound at this point. It was getting to be very dark, and all the other chickens jumped onto their perches for the night. I petted her and picked her up out of the nest, and tried to sooth her for a little bit. Then I put her onto the ground, and she walked into the coop, and jumped onto the perch. At that point, I realized there was nothing else that could be done for the night, and I'd have to see how she was doing in the morning.

This morning, she seems to be moving slowly and standing still a lot, I saw her poop, which is good. Her vent seems to look normal, and she is puffed up.

What could be going on? I'm going to see if she heads back into the nest today.

 

[Wezdin]

She doesn't look egg bound, just cold

 

[azygous]

She does not appear to be broody. A broody hen is restless, nervous, cranky, and usually emits an almost constant, low volume popping noise, punctuated by frequent puffing up of feathers, usually blasting out a loud screech as she shakes herself out.

Has this hen ever laid a soft shell or shell-less egg? If two eggs are released by the ovary closely in sequence, one might get hung up inside, causing the sort of discomfort we're seeing.

If you have some people calcium, calcium citrate or calcium gluconate, give her the whole table with a good amount of warm water. When fluids are crucial, I usually tube the water into the crop to be sure the hen is good and hydrated. If you aren't able to do this, use a syringe and slowly dribble the water into the right side of her beak.

Then you need to place her in a quiet, warm place for her to relax and get that other egg out. The coop nest is fine as long as she can remain there undisturbed by others. If there's a lot of pressure by other layers to hurry and get off the nest, it will only add to her stress and inhibit her passing the egg or remains of the egg.

If it turns out she's had an egg rupture inside her, I strongly recommend a round of an antibiotic to head off any infection from the inflammation a stuck egg can cause.

 

[Brigwy]

She does not appear to be broody. A broody hen is restless, nervous, cranky, and usually emits an almost constant, low volume popping noise, punctuated by frequent puffing up of feathers, usually blasting out a loud screech as she shakes herself out.

Has this hen ever laid a soft shell or shell-less egg? If two eggs are released by the ovary closely in sequence, one might get hung up inside, causing the sort of discomfort we're seeing.

If you have some people calcium, calcium citrate or calcium gluconate, give her the whole table with a good amount of warm water. When fluids are crucial, I usually tube the water into the crop to be sure the hen is good and hydrated. If you aren't able to do this, use a syringe and slowly dribble the water into the right side of her beak.

Then you need to place her in a quiet, warm place for her to relax and get that other egg out. The coop nest is fine as long as she can remain there undisturbed by others. If there's a lot of pressure by other layers to hurry and get off the nest, it will only add to her stress and inhibit her passing the egg or remains of the egg.

If it turns out she's had an egg rupture inside her, I strongly recommend a round of an antibiotic to head off any infection from the inflammation a stuck egg can cause.

She has never laid a soft shell/no shell egg. Thanks for the tips, how can I tell if there is a egg or a ruptured egg?

 

[micstrachan]

How is your girl? Did she ever lay the egg, if she indeed had one in the pipeline?

 

[Brigwy]

How is your girl? Did she ever lay the egg, if she indeed had one in the pipeline?

She's broody. I have her in a broody breaker right now. Although, I was just about to post this question... Yesterday, I got a buff egg in the morning and at night. I only have 2 buffs (1 the broody) is it possible the 1 laid 2 or that the other laid even though she's broody? It seems it's rare, but possible for young layers to lay twice. However, today, there was a buff egg, and now my other buff is back in there! We'll see if I get an egg again, which would lead me to believe I was getting eggs from my broody buff. Otherwise maybe the other is going broody as well.