- Jun 21, 2013
- 10
- 5
- 31
Hoping for some feedback from anyone with any experience with a gagging chicken... My littlest pullet, Xena, suddenly passed away today with very little warning. We're so devastated.
She was sneezing a bit yesterday, but nothing really out of the ordinary, but when I came out to check on them this afternoon, I noticed she was stretching her neck out and opening her mouth very wide every 10 seconds or so. I couldn't see anything in her mouth, didn't feel anything in the throat, and the crop was completely empty. However, I noticed that she felt disturbingly light when I picked her up. I brought her inside and tried to give her some dry crumble and water w/ electrolytes, but left the room for an hour, and came back to find her dead.
What could this be? I'm terrified it's a bug that's been passed to my other birds, but they all seemed fine as of bedtime. The only think I've been doing differently lately is experimenting with some fermented feed (water, grower crumble, and ACV), as they don't seem to be growing much. Could that have somehow done something to her? I have one other hen currently in "hospital" for what I think is a bad cold, but there's none of the overt gagging that I saw in the dead bird today.
Any help or advice would be so appreciated; this is my first flock, and I feel horrible that I might not have seen something in time or accidentally did something to cause Xena's demise...
She was sneezing a bit yesterday, but nothing really out of the ordinary, but when I came out to check on them this afternoon, I noticed she was stretching her neck out and opening her mouth very wide every 10 seconds or so. I couldn't see anything in her mouth, didn't feel anything in the throat, and the crop was completely empty. However, I noticed that she felt disturbingly light when I picked her up. I brought her inside and tried to give her some dry crumble and water w/ electrolytes, but left the room for an hour, and came back to find her dead.
What could this be? I'm terrified it's a bug that's been passed to my other birds, but they all seemed fine as of bedtime. The only think I've been doing differently lately is experimenting with some fermented feed (water, grower crumble, and ACV), as they don't seem to be growing much. Could that have somehow done something to her? I have one other hen currently in "hospital" for what I think is a bad cold, but there's none of the overt gagging that I saw in the dead bird today.
Any help or advice would be so appreciated; this is my first flock, and I feel horrible that I might not have seen something in time or accidentally did something to cause Xena's demise...