Lily4flow
In the Brooder
- Aug 19, 2022
- 3
- 0
- 10
I have a beginner layer who hatched at the beginning of April. A couple of days ago I went to check on my flock of three and noticed she wasn’t in the run, so I checked the coop and she was sitting on the roost, falling asleep and jerking awake again every once in a while. She would not come down even after I let them out to explore the yard, would not eat or drink, so we looked to the internet and decided she might have an egg stuck? She hadn’t laid that day. We gave her an espom salt bath as advised by a website, but when we took her out she seemed alert and didn’t want to sleep anymore, started following her flock again. She is a the bottom of the pecking order as far as I can tell. The next day the same thing happened and I took her off the roost again, but she explored with her flock faster this time. We did not use the bath again, and she seemed to be recovering after we made sure she ate every day, at least a little. I thought maybe she had heat stress as she is a very fluffy chicken with feathers on her feet as well and she was panting, but as she got better she seemed to have vision problems, she would reach to peck something but stop too far away or have to touch the object with her beak before eating a watermelon or such. We have younger chicks by about a month who we’re also exploring the yard one day she started following them. The little chicks were frightened by the larger chickens but since she didn’t peck them they were fine with her after a while, until we went around and handed out food and she lashed out at the rooster holding onto a lower back feather and pulling it while he ran around yelling. She then rejoined the older chickens. She still hasn’t laid an egg since, and follows her flock very slowly sometimes getting left behind. She has started eating better but still can’t see well. Anything I should do?
