I need help with sick chicken!

[cottonwood23]

I have two hens that are about 5 months old who have diarrhea and aren't looking as energetic as before. Still scratch and go crazy for food. Drinking plenty of water but seem to be laying down more than usual. I took those two out and monitoring them. Today I noticed one has a terrible looking "vent" and all around area.. Never had this issue before.. Non of those age have started laying.. So not sure what has caused this .

 

[235chickens]

http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=17568.0

Might help.

 

[cottonwood23]

http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=17568.0

Might help.

What's strange is the diarrhea is like a normal brown color. Doesn't make much sense but obviously something isn't right

 

[aart]

Do you have other birds?
Just these two pullets have this?
What exactly and all are you feeding?

 

[cottonwood23]

Do you have other birds?
Just these two pullets have this?
What exactly and all are you feeding?

Only that one hen bottom looks like this. The other hen just has diarrhea. So I took both out and put in seperate pen. We feed them laying mash and some scratch.. Keep everything clean as possible everyday

 

[aart]

Quote: But do you have other chickens in the same flock?
Are these two new to the flock?
How long has this been going on?

Layer mash and scratch can be rather short on the protein....birds that aren't laying shouldn't eat layer mash.

 

[cottonwood23]

But do you have other chickens in the same flock?
Are these two new to the flock?
How long has this been going on?

Layer mash and scratch can be rather short on the protein....birds that aren't laying shouldn't eat layer mash.

We have 6 total in that pen . 2 of them are sick. Has been about a week now. We added those two and one other about 3 weeks ago now. And they are about 5 months. So any time they should start laying

 

[aart]

Quote: Could be they brought something in with them.....or there's something was already there that they were not immune too.
They might not start laying as soon as you anticipate if they are ill with some organism and not getting sufficient nutrition to fight it off.
Get a bag of grower or starter to up the protein, stop with the layer as they don't need all that calcium.

 

[cottonwood23]

Could be they brought something in with them.....or there's something was already there that they were not immune too.
They might not start laying as soon as you anticipate if they are ill with some organism and not getting sufficient nutrition to fight it off.
Get a bag of grower or starter to up the protein, stop with the layer as they don't need all that calcium.

OK thanks for the help! How long can you feed grower or starter?!

 

[aart]

Quote: Foreever...well.... learn a bit about protein, and start reading labels.

My Feeding Notes: I like to feed a flock raiser/grower/finisher 20% protein crumble to all ages and genders, as non-layers(chicks, males and molting birds) do not need the extra calcium that is in layer feed and chicks and molters can use the extra protein. Makes life much simpler to store and distribute one type of chow that everyone can eat. I do grind up the crumbles (in the blender) for the chicks for the first week or so.

The higher protein crumble also offsets the 8% protein scratch grains and other kitchen/garden scraps I like to offer. I adjust the amounts of other feeds to get the protein levels desired with varying situations.

Calcium should be available at all times for the layers, I use oyster shell mixed with rinsed, dried, crushed chicken egg shells in a separate container.

Animal protein (mealworms, a little cheese - beware the salt content, meat scraps) is provided during molting and if I see any feather eating.