vantain
Songster
Hen is a 3 1/2 year old ISA Brown. Her name is Gwyneth, and she is the top hen of a flock of other mixed breeds. She is the oldest of the current bunch.
Some history....she stopped laying about 10 months ago. Her comb shrunk back down, and her legs returned to a yellow color, like they were before she started laying at maturity. She is a very feisty hen, and has a history of being a tyrannical lead hen, and you can read all about that in some of my previous threads. That said, she is the boss, but has mellowed out quite a bit over the last year.
Fast forward to now. Gwyneth has been acting off now for about 10-14 days. I was letting them all out for supervised free ranging every afternoon. I think she has a tendency to eat a little too much grass, and seemed to get a bit of impacted crop about 10 days ago when her symptoms started. She began acting a bit lethargic, but not all day, just a different periods of the day, and was standing with the typical head down, tail down demeanor. She just wasn't participating in normal events. I also noticed that she wasn't eating much if at all. In fact, she has lost about 1 pound of weight over the last 10-14 days. Her highest weight was 4.7lbs, and she is currently down to 3.8 as of this morning.
As mentioned, she doesn't seem to be eating much, and I have noticed that she often goes to roost with very little in her crop. And actually, that has been going on all summer, and as we start moving into winter, had me concerned already. That said, there are never any or very very little dropping under her spot on the roost, and I often find that her crop has not completely emptied. Maybe it is just slow crop, or something else.
Like I said, she doesn't spend all day lethargic, just periods of the day. When she isn't acting lethargic, she is scratching in the run, digging out giant holes, dust bathing, preening..etc....all normal things, but she just doesn't appear to want to eat anything. As I write this, she is vigorously dust bathing.
She also went through a full molt a few weeks ago, and now has the nicest coat of feathers I have seen on her in quite a long time. And when I look her over, there are still a few pin feathers coming in around her neck, but not very many, mainly filling in maybe for winter?
Anyway, I'm perplexed as to how to handle her right now. Our temperatures will be dropping soon enough, and I know how important it is for them to go to roost with full crops. Her recent behavior of going to roost without eating is concerning enough, but her general lack of appetite is causing her to lose a lot of weight.
Any ideas on what is going on here, and how to tackle it?
Some history....she stopped laying about 10 months ago. Her comb shrunk back down, and her legs returned to a yellow color, like they were before she started laying at maturity. She is a very feisty hen, and has a history of being a tyrannical lead hen, and you can read all about that in some of my previous threads. That said, she is the boss, but has mellowed out quite a bit over the last year.
Fast forward to now. Gwyneth has been acting off now for about 10-14 days. I was letting them all out for supervised free ranging every afternoon. I think she has a tendency to eat a little too much grass, and seemed to get a bit of impacted crop about 10 days ago when her symptoms started. She began acting a bit lethargic, but not all day, just a different periods of the day, and was standing with the typical head down, tail down demeanor. She just wasn't participating in normal events. I also noticed that she wasn't eating much if at all. In fact, she has lost about 1 pound of weight over the last 10-14 days. Her highest weight was 4.7lbs, and she is currently down to 3.8 as of this morning.
As mentioned, she doesn't seem to be eating much, and I have noticed that she often goes to roost with very little in her crop. And actually, that has been going on all summer, and as we start moving into winter, had me concerned already. That said, there are never any or very very little dropping under her spot on the roost, and I often find that her crop has not completely emptied. Maybe it is just slow crop, or something else.
Like I said, she doesn't spend all day lethargic, just periods of the day. When she isn't acting lethargic, she is scratching in the run, digging out giant holes, dust bathing, preening..etc....all normal things, but she just doesn't appear to want to eat anything. As I write this, she is vigorously dust bathing.
She also went through a full molt a few weeks ago, and now has the nicest coat of feathers I have seen on her in quite a long time. And when I look her over, there are still a few pin feathers coming in around her neck, but not very many, mainly filling in maybe for winter?
Anyway, I'm perplexed as to how to handle her right now. Our temperatures will be dropping soon enough, and I know how important it is for them to go to roost with full crops. Her recent behavior of going to roost without eating is concerning enough, but her general lack of appetite is causing her to lose a lot of weight.
Any ideas on what is going on here, and how to tackle it?