Hen attacked by bobcat, still not eating, can't see?

[Bucket289]

I have a one year old Rhode Island Red hen. A week ago today my husband and I went out to check on the chickens and she was standing at the far side of the run with her bloody head up against the coop. We have determined that she had her head stuck out of the run trying to reach some grass and a bobcat tried to pull her thru the fence. We put her in a dog carrier to separate her from the others. She has small wounds on her comb and face, and though we saw both of her eyes looking normal after the attack they were swelled shut the next day. She also has a wound on one side of her neck, it started out about the size of a quarter. We have been putting wound coat on the wound on her neck, and rinsing her eyes with a saline solution. The neck wound is much better, less than the size of a dime now. On Saturday my husband wanted to look at her eyes, they were sealed shut, so he loosened the gunk around them and we got them open. One appears sort of watery but still yellow, and the other had a thick covering of a white rubbery substance, after reading about others experiences with something similar on here, I gently pushed on her eyelid and it came out, it was HUGE! That eye looks really red, and she doesn't open them unless you really disturb her, like when you are doctoring her wounds. We haven't gotten her to eat or drink a whole lot mostly she just sleeps I think because she can't see. We put an electrolyte/vitamin solution in her water, and she will drink some if you put her beak in the water, but then she starts falling asleep again. We tried the same with watered down crumbles and she eats a little. Yesterday I read that it would be good to feed her scrambled egg, and she would swallow that on her own if I put it in her mouth. She ate about half the egg and a few grapes this way yesterday. Her poop has been runny and green for the most part, since yesterday it has been a lot firmer though. I am just wondering what else I can do, what I can try to feed her and how much I should be shooting for. I am pretty new to chickens, we've only had them two months. Thanks for any advice you can provide!

 

[Hollywood Chickens]

She is probably in shock, it sound like you are doing a great job!

You just have to make sure she eats and drinks and she will pull through.

 

[Bucket289]

Thanks, I really hope she makes it! Does anyone else have any advice for getting her to eat? I've really only had luck with putting egg in her mouth and trying to get her to swallow. If she's more awake she fights me, but I don't know what else to do. She just wants to lay there.

Oh, and we finally trapped the bobcat that did this to her yesterday. We had a trap with a place for live bait and rotated out our two cockerels in there. The first one is missing feathers from his thigh and limping some where the cat got him but it isn't too bad. The second one seemed to be a little in shock yesterday (he was the one in there when we finally caught the cat) and both boys spent most of the day on the roost. It was pretty funny to see our tough guys being not so tough!

 

[TheMainException]

I love that you used the roos for live bait...that's funny.

It sounds like you are doing a great job taking care of your hen. If she puts up too much of a fuss in eating, maybe one of you could hold her body and head and the other could try feeding her with a turkey baster or something that they might sell at a place like TSC or animal equipment supply store. You could mix in some wet food with vitamin solution and water and slowly feed that to her. I had to do this with a lizard I owned once...took about two people with that thing and I suspect a chicken wouldn't much appreciate it either. But if she's eating with only slight prodding every day, maybe you don't need to do that.