help! chicken being very listless and not sure what to do

[mchad]

We have had six healthy chickens for close to a month. 3 brown hens, 2 araucanas, 1 black sex link. They are all around a year old and when we bought them the man selling them said they were all good layers. We are getting around 5 eggs a day and not sure who is not laying, although it seems to be one of the brown hens based on eggs colors. We have gotten tiny eggs twice. The chicken who I believe is not laying, the brown hen Patsy, would not leave the nesting box yesterday. I thought she might be acting broody but there were no eggs, and she was very docile when picked up and not at all defensive about getting moved, not making any noises. Last night she did not roost with the other girls and stayed in the nest. This morning she is out of the coop but quite listless. This is a chicken that usually will not allow you to pick her up, and today I was picking her up and feeling if she was egg bound with no response from her. I cannot feel an egg inside. She is just laying on the ground..the dog even came up to outside of the run and started barking at her very closely and she did not respond at all. I tried to place her on the roost outside of the coop and she did not grip on at all and just fell to the ground. She left one wing just laying out, which I put back into place. She is now laying on the ground on her chest with her eyes closed, and her back appears to be pulsating. What should I do? Her comb and beak have no change in appearance. Not sure if I should quarantine since I don't want the other girls getting sick...any advice at all???? Please!?!? I am new to this chicken thing and very busy in school so don't really have time to be placing the chicken in rehab inside...but any advice will help! I have looked on many other posts and can't find behaviors that quite match this one...eggbound? broody? sick? dying? I hope not!

Thank you,
Molly

 

[Judy]

Welcome to BYC, and I'm sorry this is what brought you here. I don't know what is wrong with your hen. If you are sure she is the one with laying problems, this is likely to be tied to the cause, though. She could be eggbound or an internal layer, or even have a tumor. Problems of this sort seem to be fairly common in chickens from hatcheries and bred to lay a lot of eggs.