Hen panting heavily 24/7 - reproductive, gapeworm, or respiratory?

[Cinnaminute]

Update: Intermittent laying, swelling and deflating without needing a draining!

So early September Cleo started to lay eggs again, but only 2 in the span of 1-2 weeks. One egg was a huge double yolk. Then she just stopped.

September 20th, Cleo started to fill up again. I noticed she started feeling heavier and couple days she was panting a little bit. She also seemed a tad under the weather, but generally still fine - eager to run out into the yard to free range and dust bathe. I was trying to decide if I should drain her then or wait a bit longer for her to fill a little more. I opted to wait.

Then Hurricane Helene hit and we didn't have power for 6 days. During that time I was really stressed and wasn't paying much attention to her (or the others - just bare minimum care).

Anyway, a few days ago I noticed something odd - Cleo was lighter! All that fluid she was starting to build up was gone again. And she's doing great.

I'll update this post with pictures tomorrow! But I'm very glad she cleared up on her own. It's odd, though. The ascites seems to coincide with egg laying. Most of my hens are going into a molt and I wonder if she might be too and if that's related to her not filling/deflating.

 

[Cinnaminute]

Cleo Update

Sorry for forgetting the pictures last time.

I wanted to share that since my last post, Cleo would fill up a bit every so often and then the buildup would decrease. So she was doing super.

However, during April she filled up really bad. I let it go since it didn't seem to be bothering her (though apparently I didn't notice her eating less and less). I was hoping she would follow the same trend, but she didn't. It got so bad she had to stand with her legs far apart and would waddle when she walked. She was practically a walking water balloon. But her behavior was fine and normal.



On May 3rd I poked her and let her drain on her own (as I do). I also preemptively gave her some aspirin. Pretty much all of the fluid came out over the next 24 hours. She slow dripped for that long!



Comb as it started turning purple.

I was shocked to see how thin she truly was: her breast bone is insanely prominent. She's likely emaciated. The draining made her more active, running and foraging like normal. Her behavior was good, but her appetite was next to none. She was very weak, enough to fall over with too much exertion. Her comb was already flopped over and not as plump as the laying girls, but it turned so purple and shriveled that I thought it'd fall off. I didn't get a picture since I was really stressed and worried.

It took a lot longer for her to recover. Her comb finally started losing the purple hue and turning pink around the 9th. I've been offering her everything I can to encourage her to eat. She'd eat tomato before her feed, so I'd give her that. A few blueberries. Finally yesterday she started eating her feed a bit again, so she's getting there. Her feet and wattles are no longer cold to the touch. All this to say, she definitely went into shock but is on the up. Here's hoping I don't need to drain her for a good 6+ months again.

P.S. I'm wondering if there's a way to stop her draining on her own after she's lost some of the fluid, just so she doesn't go into shock. Wound glue, perhaps? Will research this.