ChristinaMay
Chirping
It was suggested I share my hens story with frost bite to help anyone dealing with something similar. During a winter storm in Feb 2019, my chickens coop flipped on it’s roof and one of my hens escaped through the vent. She was blown into my back horse pasture and buried in snow when I found her. Because the coop was still standing at midnight and I found her at 5am, my guess is she was back there for an hour or more. I brought her inside basically frozen and put her in my warm bathroom, where she thawed and laid an egg. Her feet were frozen solid and I knew she would end up losing them. I put her in a cat carrier in my basement to see what happened with her feet. Within a week they were blistered badly, and within a few weeks they were well on their way to turning black. I coated them in antiseptic spray and wrapped them daily - she didn’t try to stand at all once they got hard. I never gave her pain medicine because she never showed signs of being in pain, and actually started laying eggs regularly about a month after I brought her inside. About 4 months after this happened, her feet were completely dead and only being held on by dead bone. I cut them off and there was no bleeding and she still never showed signs of pain. I kept spraying her nubs with antiseptic and wrapped them in gauze and coban wrap. She tried standing after a couple Of days. I also gave her Warm epsom salt soaks every other day throughout the entire 5 month process. Within a month her nubs healed over and she moved into her very own coop next to our back porch in June. It’s been 10 months since this happened and she is doing great! She needed her wings for balance at first but she gets around walking now without using her wings amazingly well. I keep her legs wrapped (the gauze for padding, and the coban wrap forms a little shoe) and change it every other week. Because her feet died midway up her leg bone (leaving bone then skin), I was never able to get her legs to callus without causing an abscess (I tried once and she was forming an abscess within a couple of hours). I’m attaching pictures of the process for reference. As far as her mental health goes, since she’s alone I take her out with me to feed and visit with the chickens, ducks, horse and goats daily unless the weather is bad. I also take her on daily walks to check the mail, and my husband takes her on tractor rides and trail cam check walks. Her name is Peg 
I always worry about my ducks getting foot problems because I don’t think any of them could survive like a chicken could without a foot or feet. Thank you! I used fishmox when she got a small abscess on her nub the day I left the wrap off for a couple of hours as a precaution. I worry about her leg bone continuing to die because of the way her leg died mid bone. That picture of her nub with the new tissue is from the Summer, they’re a lot smaller now without the swelling and are evenly colored - I’m hoping that means the bone is ok inside!
