Hen bleeding!

[ChickenTeen13]

My hens were in their coop today and when I got home I noticed one of them was bleeding. There were drops of blood in the coop and on the ramp into it. The blood was on her lower breastbone and legs. It couldn't have been an animal. Do you think it was one of the other chickens picking on her? I thought the wound was in a weird spot for that. I decided to rinse off the wound with warm water. While i was doing this I noticed a small bruised bump that was still bleeding slightly.Maybe the bleeding was from a plucked feather? I didn't notice anywhere else that the skin was broken but it was hard to see. Do plucked feathers usually cause this much bleeding? Any other advice for what to do?


Here are a few photos:

 

[ChickenGirl22]

Plucked and broken feathers usually bleed quite a lot. I recommend cleaning it best you can and using poly sporin. There's no easy way to tell unless you see it happen. It could have been an animal, another chicken, or just an accident that she stumbles into somehow. There's also a lot more advice on BYC and google that can help more with wound cleaning than I can.

 

[ChickenTeen13]

Thanks. I think I'll just wait and see what happens. I might try to put some cream on it.

 

[Indigosands]

Give that gal a full bath to get rid of all the blood. If the other hens see it they'll pick the daylights out of her! It sounds like she had a pinfeather break off.

 

[ChickenTeen13]

After I rinsed most of the blood off, I just let her be. She slept with the other chickens and she didn't start bleeding again so I don't think the others are picking on her. The hen's feathers were still a little crusty but I'm thinking she will take some dust baths and groom herself until the feathers are back to normal. Is this true?

 

[ChickenTeen13]

Today the wound was still not bleeding so I'm very happy. To help it heal I put "Bag Balm" on it. It is supposed to help the skin heal and keep both the injured hen, and the other hens from picking at the wound because they don"t like the smell/taste of it. You can get it at a drug store because people are suposed to put it on their dry skin. It was originally to put on cow utters so is safe for animals too.

 

[ChickenTeen13]

It must have been worse then just a plucked feather because all of the sudden the hen died.

It was a little less then a week after the first injury.. The scab on it didn't look infected or anything. I don't know what happened. Thanks for the help anyway.

 

[growyourbrew]

I'm sorry to hear about your loss It's hard to say though, it might not even have been from the injury. I've had chickens look like fine in the morning and in the evening just dead. It happens