Egg safe to eat from limping chicken?

[newfeather]

We are very excited that are chickens started to lay eggs!

We have 3 chickens and one of the RIR limps- has been limping for 2 months at least. Her toes are kind of limp. We don't know why. We give her Polyvisol sometimes thinking it will help. We don't know how she hurt her leg. Then we noticed on the hock of her "bad leg", she has feather "stubs" - not a complete loss of feathers. Other than that she seems to be fine- very friendly and seems to be happy.

Sometimes the other RIR (her normally best buddy) picks at her hock and back so we had to separate them and let her back heal. Don't know why the other RIR does this or if it caused her feather "loss".

We didn't think she'd lay eggs because the other RIR laid way before her. Anyway, she just started laying and her egg looks OK when we opened it, same as the other RIR.

Do you think it's OK to eat her eggs even though we don't quite know why she limps and her hock area doesn't quite look as healthy? Thank you for your help!

 

[debilorrah]

It sounds ok to eat them, but I am far from expert.... Is she otherwise healthy?

 

[newfeather]

Yes, she seems otherwise healthy. I hope that her "leg" will get better. She is so friendly!

 

[silkiechicken]

Sure, but if you treat her with drugs, then discard them.

I'd venture to guess 95% of sickness won't hurt the eggs if any are produced, but 95% of treatments would entail you to toss 10-14 days of eggs.

 

[dancingbear]

Quote:
I hope her leg gets better, too. Why the quotation marks? It is really a leg, isn't it? Not her quote, "leg" unquote?

If you don't see any sign of infection, I don't see why it would be a problem to eat the eggs. Is the joint swollen, puffy, or discolored? If it is, she may have been bitten by something, or have an infection in the joint. If it's just an injury of some sort, but no infection, there shouldn't be a problem.

It sounds like you really like this particular hen. I hope she'll get better. I hate losing the sweet natured ones.

The problem could be from the other hen pecking her all the time. If she does it again when the hurt hen eventually rejoins the flock, you might try smearing some Bag Balm or Vicks on the picked at areas. They don't like that heavy ointment, she probably wouldn't peck more than a few times, she'd be trying to wipe goo off her beak. Especially the Bag Balm, it's a much stiffer ointment, and harder to wipe off. It can be messy on the hen you smear it on, dirt will stick to it and she'll look just awful for a little while, but if it stopped the habitual pecking from the other hen it would be worth it.

 

[newfeather]

Thank you for your replies! I actually don't know if it's her leg or her toes that causes her to limp. Her leg is fine- no swelling and no infection. Her toes are kind of limp... hard to describe. It just seems like a long time for an injury to heal. I don't know how she could've hurt herself- our set-up is pretty simple and safe. The only treatment with done is the Polyvisol because I couldn't find anything similar on the injuries I've read about. There isn't much resources here in the suburbs

So I hope she'll manage along fine with her one good leg.

 

[greyfields]

yes