Injured Red Sex Link 19 Week Old Hen - Broken Foot and punctured breast/lung area

[LoLoGarrett]

Ughhh.... We put up an electric fence, hoping to keep our girls safe. I worked from home yesterday and checked outside many times. Shortly after getting on a 2 PM conference my dog barks. Thinking that it is just bicycles going up our road, I put the dog out to keep him from interrupting my conference call. My call ended at 2:35, I walk outside to check on things, only to discover that the chicken yard has feathers everywhere and I have a dead hen in my yard, one hen is missing and I have 3 hens gathered together on the side of the coop and 3 indoors. At this point I am glad it was not the entire flock for once. The dead bird had no injuries on her, other than a broken neck, but no other signs of being torn up. After taking a look around for the missing hen and trying to figure out what access point the predator found to get into the chicken yard/coop, I check on the 3 hens gathered close to the outside of the chicken coop and pet and pick up each one. While petting one of the girls, I notice blood splatters on her feet and a bloody feather. Then I realize one of her feet has no strength and is floppy and then try to find out where the blood is coming from. underneath her breast area I notice a good sized puncture wound where the blood is coming from. The feathers keep me from seeing how deep the wound is and I don't want to hurt any more than she already is. She still tries to walk some, but when she does he foot is curled up and obviously it is difficult for her to walk. I placed her inside the coop on some rabbit straw with a bowl of water that she could reach. The other girls keep gathering around her, which worries me that they will begin to peck at her. I honestly did not expect her to survive the night. To my surprise she made it through the night and the other girls did not do any damage to her. So hopefully they are just being protective of her. Sorry for this very long post. Now to my point.... Is there anything that I can do for her foot and anyway to treat her puncture wound without making it worse? By the way, we now have added the aviary netting over the chicken yard. I swear if the electric fencing and netting do not work, I am done raising chickens. We have lost so many! And not during the night, when they are locked in safe and sound. Always lose them in the middle of the day! So frustrating. I am wondering if this last attack was a hawk? We did notice fox paws on the tops of the fence, but that could be from the last kill before the electric fence?

 

[Eggcessive]

Can you see a vet for an xray? Is there any break in the skin on the entire leg, any red, swelling, or green bruising? Depending on the bone, if there is a fracture, it may be splinted. We need a picture of the chest wound, and the leg injury if possible. Try to trim feathers around the wound, spray it with Chlorhexide or Vetericyn and a gentle sprayer or spray bottle may be good to reach down into the wound. Then apply plain Neosporin or Triple Antibiotic Ointment to the wound twice a day. Can you tell if her crop on the right upper chest, is damaged?

 

[Eggcessive]

Here is a video of splinting a leg, and a good splinting article pages 18-22:
https://theiwrc.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Duerr_Splinting_Manual_2010.pdf

 

[Ihavesomechickens]

It seems to me the predators had a party and attacked everyone. I would assume the one with a broken neck is a victim of a hawk attack, the missing one could be a fox or hawk, and the puncture wound was probably a hawk. I doubt that the fox actually attacked because all of the chickens have signs of a hawk attack.

Eggcessive’s posts above has good information about treatment.

 

[LoLoGarrett]

Thank you both. I think it is a Hawk as well, so hopefully the netting overhead will prevent that from happening again. Just need to attach reflectors next to keep birds from getting trapped. I saw that same video this morning. I am not sure it is her leg that is broken though, that is what I am trying to figure out. It seems more her foot than leg. If she tries to walk, she walks with her foot curled in and walks on it like a clubbed foot. I have been watching other videos where they splay the chicken foot out onto a bandage and then wrap around that to help build strength back on their foot. I am tempted to take her to the vet, but not sure the vet can do much more than anything I can do at home? Not to mention that is an expensive vet visit.