gardengal22
In the Brooder
- Mar 12, 2022
- 13
- 2
- 34
Hello all! So- my family and I have a sweet, ancient old hen (10+) with cataracts who is towards the end of her life. She still loves sunbathing and eating watermelon though (and knows where the food and water is), so I am trying to give her the best life I can for as long as I can. We will humanely euthanize the first time she has a bad day. She's been doing fairly well but recently she has been losing some weight, and watching her eat it seems that she has a lot of clear mucus/possibly just saliva in her mouth that seems to be impairing her ability to swallow. She is hungry, wants to eat and can find the food- she just can't seem to swallow it! When she does get it down, occasionally she will open her mouth really wide and shake her head, slinging food and saliva everywhere. I checked in the back of her mouth and while I obviously can't look down her esophagus, everything looks normal- no wet pox lesions or signs of fungal disease. Although the area around her crop feels almost airy (??) big and squishy when empty, her breath certainly doesn't smell foul and her crop is emptying normally. I've been supplementally tube-feeding her about once a day although I may need to do so more often. My suspicion is that the problem may not be digestive at all, but may be coming from the respiratory tract. She and her flock have had Mycoplasma in the past, but she is not exhibiting labored breathing or snicking consistent with a full on attack. One of her flockmates (also very old) seems to be having a similar but much more dramatic problem- while she is swallowing food just fine, when she lowers her head occasionally she will start spitting up clear mucus in a stream. Does anyone have any quality-of-life treatment ideas? I feel like antihistamines would at least address the symptoms, but does anyone know if they work for chickens? I just want to help clear the mucus from their throats so they can eat more and be happier longer!
