Hen with red vent...

[nobodyherebutuschickens]

My 2 year old Red Star girl has several odd symtoms that I'm not sure how to treat. She lives with 11 other chickens that peck at her sometimes. Her feathers are thin in the best of places, and bald on her head, shoulders and back. This might just be from the roosters, or could something be giving her a predisposition to breakable feathers? Her vent has also become very stretched and wide, and the top part of it has become red and a little inflamed. It seems like this has been going on for a couple of months, and I've been finding soft shelled under the roosting poles for quite some time, too. Tonight I witnessed the Red Star squirting out another shelless egg, and I'm getting a little worried. She's been eating and drinking and acting normally, seeking plenty of attention and snuggles. I haven't paid much attention to her poops, so I'll be doing that in the next few days. The other birds seem to be doing just fine, though one of them recently came up blind in one eye. I attempted to search for some clue of what's going on with my hen in the BYC archives, and immediately turned into a chicken-hypochondriac. Could she have worms? Is she just stressed? If it is worms, I'm going to need plenty of advice and links on how to treat them. What do you think?

 

[Judy]

A lot of people routinely worm their chickens, but then a lot don't, too. I like Valbazen - about $40, ordered online, just google or order from Amazon or First Vet Supply, I think it is. Or you can get Safeguard, a goat wormer, at the feed store. There's also piperazine available at feed stores, the only wormer actually approved for chickens, but it only gets one type of worm. I'll put some links here for you.

What I would do first with your bird is treat for lice and mites. If she has them, they all need to be treated because all till have at least some. These little critters can be dropped into your chicken yard from wild birds flying overhead; they're very common. Sevin 5% garden dust works well. You have to clean and treat the coop, then do it all again in 10 days, to get the hatched eggs. A pyrethrin / piperaxine spray such as Adams flea and Tick Spray will also work - I use a generic version from TSC. For the Sevin, put the bird in a bag (all but the head of course) and shake, or pat on with a powder puff like the kind used for body powder. You can also put it in a shaker can and shake it on, though I find this inconvenient. I use the spray on the birds and Sevin (routinely) in the coop. Spray the underside of the roost, too.

I don't know whether this is your hen's problem, but I feel it's a good idea to use lice / mite killers routinely, maybe once a month. I've never seen these bugs on my chickens, though I don't believe for a minute they have never been there.

There are lots of threads and probably some articles about worms and lice / mites, but here are a few links:

http://healthybirds.umd.edu/Disease/Deworming Birds.pdf

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/...ts-is-not-coryza-or-crd-parasites-are-rampant

http://ucanr.org/freepubs/docs/8162.pdf

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/473518/rooster-not-normal#post_6006304