aphelion
In the Brooder
- Aug 3, 2021
- 6
- 3
- 22
Hello! I apologize for not making an introduction post first, I plan on doing that soon! I'll try to be as detailed as possible so please excuse the giant text wall I'm about to send haha
I have a black australorp hen who suddenly became uninterested in eating last week. She is about a year and a half old now, and normally is very active and chatty! Whenever I come home from work or she sees me in the yard she always makes a beeline for me while clucking very loud. She also usually loves jumping up onto my arm and getting patted and carried around, and before bed would jump into my arms for a bit so I could tell her goodnight! Can you tell I have a soft spot for her yet LOL
My chickens are let out into their run at 7AM and then we let them out to free range and 12-1PM until they come back in for the night. All of my chickens have been vaccinated for Marek's. They were recently on an antibiotic for a bacterial infection that was prescribed by my vet for 21 days, and have since been off of it for the past three weeks. She doesn't seem to be getting bullied, but we did change their food from crumbles to pellets about a month ago (we were feeding them Dumor layer crumbles, and switched to Dumor layer pellets). The only changes in her environment that I can think of is that we have started letting our pullets from this spring start free ranging with the big girls since they're old enough now. I can't imagine this is stressing her out since she happily free ranges alongside them but I'm at a loss as to what could be affecting her.
It all started last week, I noticed she was a bit lethargic and not her usual self. She was lying down more than usual but it had been hot that day and chalked it up to the heat getting to her. The next day her comb had become a bit paler than usual and was flopping over so I knew it was time to give her a look over to figure out what was bothering her. She didn't seem to have any mites or injuries and there was food in her crop at the time. I did notice she was making very quiet and sad sounding clucks. I wasn't quite sure what to do and it was a Saturday so I wasn't able to take her to the vet as they were closed. The next day she had perked up and was suddenly more active, but her comb was still paler than the others and I had noticed her poops were either watery and bubbly, or normal but very small.
I started really watching her and realized she was coming back at night with a small crop as if she wasn't eating much. I started trying to hand feed her different foods to encourage her to eat and she would only eat anything I chopped into very small pieces. If it was "too big" she would simply pick it up and drop it or scoop it out of my hand. She was uninterested in eating her pellets, but would eat some egg for me. The only thing she's very interested in eating is blueberries since they're her favorite snack but I wouldn't give her many since they're for treats only and not very nutritious to her diet of course. While she's free ranging during the day she seemed to be foraging with the others but she was still coming back with a pretty empty crop compared to the others! Hers was barely the size of a golfball while the others were baseball sized for lack of a better comparison.
I was finally able to take her to the vet on Wednesday, and they weren't able to find anything immediately wrong with her (other than the fact that she had lost a little weight) so we did some blood tests! I was given an antibiotic to give her in the meantime and started monitoring her. The results came back normal on Friday, but I missed the call from the vet and wasn't able to ask her what to do next since she still was uninterested in eating. Since then I've been taking her inside in the morning to try to get her to eat some pellets and eggs, she eats only some of the eggs for me. I've tried breaking the pellets up into crumbles and adding water to make them more mushy, but she will not eat them at all. Later on she'll do a normal sized poop with a normal consistency. I let her back outside during the afternoon to free range, again she seems to forage with the others but by the end of the night comes back empty handed.
I'm waiting for the vet to call me back tomorrow (they've been a bit busy these past few days and haven't been able to since Monday) to see what we can do next, I'm assuming it'll be X-rays. In the meantime I'm just very unsure what to do. Currently she is behaving like normal except her comb is pale and she's not eating at all! She's very dear to me (I love all of my chickens very much, but you always have that one you play favorites with a little!) and I just want her to be ok and back to her old self! If anyone has any suggestions as to what could be wrong or what I can do for her in the meantime I would really appreciate it, I've been losing a bit of sleep worrying about her these past few days. I do keep getting worried I'm stressing over nothing and in turn causing her unnecessary stress
I have a black australorp hen who suddenly became uninterested in eating last week. She is about a year and a half old now, and normally is very active and chatty! Whenever I come home from work or she sees me in the yard she always makes a beeline for me while clucking very loud. She also usually loves jumping up onto my arm and getting patted and carried around, and before bed would jump into my arms for a bit so I could tell her goodnight! Can you tell I have a soft spot for her yet LOL
My chickens are let out into their run at 7AM and then we let them out to free range and 12-1PM until they come back in for the night. All of my chickens have been vaccinated for Marek's. They were recently on an antibiotic for a bacterial infection that was prescribed by my vet for 21 days, and have since been off of it for the past three weeks. She doesn't seem to be getting bullied, but we did change their food from crumbles to pellets about a month ago (we were feeding them Dumor layer crumbles, and switched to Dumor layer pellets). The only changes in her environment that I can think of is that we have started letting our pullets from this spring start free ranging with the big girls since they're old enough now. I can't imagine this is stressing her out since she happily free ranges alongside them but I'm at a loss as to what could be affecting her.
It all started last week, I noticed she was a bit lethargic and not her usual self. She was lying down more than usual but it had been hot that day and chalked it up to the heat getting to her. The next day her comb had become a bit paler than usual and was flopping over so I knew it was time to give her a look over to figure out what was bothering her. She didn't seem to have any mites or injuries and there was food in her crop at the time. I did notice she was making very quiet and sad sounding clucks. I wasn't quite sure what to do and it was a Saturday so I wasn't able to take her to the vet as they were closed. The next day she had perked up and was suddenly more active, but her comb was still paler than the others and I had noticed her poops were either watery and bubbly, or normal but very small.
I started really watching her and realized she was coming back at night with a small crop as if she wasn't eating much. I started trying to hand feed her different foods to encourage her to eat and she would only eat anything I chopped into very small pieces. If it was "too big" she would simply pick it up and drop it or scoop it out of my hand. She was uninterested in eating her pellets, but would eat some egg for me. The only thing she's very interested in eating is blueberries since they're her favorite snack but I wouldn't give her many since they're for treats only and not very nutritious to her diet of course. While she's free ranging during the day she seemed to be foraging with the others but she was still coming back with a pretty empty crop compared to the others! Hers was barely the size of a golfball while the others were baseball sized for lack of a better comparison.
I was finally able to take her to the vet on Wednesday, and they weren't able to find anything immediately wrong with her (other than the fact that she had lost a little weight) so we did some blood tests! I was given an antibiotic to give her in the meantime and started monitoring her. The results came back normal on Friday, but I missed the call from the vet and wasn't able to ask her what to do next since she still was uninterested in eating. Since then I've been taking her inside in the morning to try to get her to eat some pellets and eggs, she eats only some of the eggs for me. I've tried breaking the pellets up into crumbles and adding water to make them more mushy, but she will not eat them at all. Later on she'll do a normal sized poop with a normal consistency. I let her back outside during the afternoon to free range, again she seems to forage with the others but by the end of the night comes back empty handed.
I'm waiting for the vet to call me back tomorrow (they've been a bit busy these past few days and haven't been able to since Monday) to see what we can do next, I'm assuming it'll be X-rays. In the meantime I'm just very unsure what to do. Currently she is behaving like normal except her comb is pale and she's not eating at all! She's very dear to me (I love all of my chickens very much, but you always have that one you play favorites with a little!) and I just want her to be ok and back to her old self! If anyone has any suggestions as to what could be wrong or what I can do for her in the meantime I would really appreciate it, I've been losing a bit of sleep worrying about her these past few days. I do keep getting worried I'm stressing over nothing and in turn causing her unnecessary stress
