How can you tell if a chicken is fat?

[HorseFeathers]

We have a hen who is incredibly light and bony, but eats a ton and is perfectly healthy. She is also the leader of our flock.

I guess some chickens are the exception. I always thought that the only birds you had to worry about getting overweight were Cornish Xs and the res know when to stop eating.

 

[bulldog-girl]

How to tell if your chicken is getting fat? If she asks you if her jeans make her bum look big.

Edited to add that you must say no or you'll get your shins pecked!!

 

[ChicksandWeeds]

i went by that, thinking the bones are so prominent either because i am not feeding enough (plus free range) or they have worms - so i have been feeding them more ......and it is wrong for my chickens...they ALL hade very prominent keel bones....but one was dead on the coop floor this morning....i opened her up...massive amounts of abdominal fat...she could not lay her egg...liver looked good. no worms in the intestines. i do know that when their fluffy butts are very round and full...that is where the fat is....in the abdomen...and they will have trouble pushing the egg out.

 

[CrazyTalk]

Hens carry the vast majority of their fat inside their abdomens - it's really tough to tell anything by the keel. There's very little fat in that area - prominence of the keel mostly tells you how much breast meat they have.

 

[rainbowhatchery]

This is an interesting one and new to me. Our birds have 24/7 full feeders and I have never had an overweight bird.

 

[AZDesertChick]

We just lost a chicken to fatty liver syndrome but based on how her keel felt, even the vet said she would not have considered her overweight. She consulted some avian specialist vets who said there is a big debate happening over whether the keel is an appropriate place to check for over/underweight at all - that since they don’t fly much it does not give an accurate measure. Their advice is to use the keel to check for muscle mass, but use stomach and thighs of the bird to get a more accurate sense of how healthy their weight is. I would recommend either learning to check these other locations or take any seemingly heavy chicken to a vet and have them check.