Lethargic 1 yr old Hen - Still no change

[TheBrumstead]

I think one of my hens is sick. She's a Brahma, almost a year old. She's been acting almost lethargic, now I see poop near her vent, like she's not quite lifting high enough, and she nearly lays down when I pet her (not squatting, further down) and is slow to get up. She showed no interest in bread this afternoon, but went after scratch. She is laying (I only have two hens and had two eggs today). Any ideas?


Other hen is acting just fine. I had a third, but she had similar symptoms, but worse, just after Christmas and died of an apparent heart attack when we tried to clean her vent.

 

[LittleChickenLady]

I've already given you my advice on Facebook, but I'm replying so maybe someone else will see this and try to help even more.

Good luck with her, and keep us posted.

 

[dawg53]

By your description of symptoms, basically it could possibly be 1 of 3 things or a combination; Lice/mites, worms, eggbound.

 

[TheBrumstead]

By your description of symptoms, basically it could possibly be 1 of 3 things or a combination; Lice/mites, worms, eggbound.

I checked for lice/mites and didn't see anything, but not sure what I'm looking for besides things crawling on her. I'm going to check on wormer tomorrow, but if it's not worms, do you think it could make things worse? She laid an egg today, so could she be eggbound? I checked around 2 pm and there were two eggs and I just have the two hens.

 

[klmclain1]

Worming should not hurt her...and it does not sound like she's eggbound (given the evidence). I would do it right away!

 

[TheBrumstead]

Morning update:

Lace came rushing out of the coop like she always does when I open the door. She got her fair share of the scrambled eggs I made them. I watched her for about 20 minutes. She moved around a little bit, but slowly. She did drink about as much as my RIR did. She does have droopy wings, but did preen a tiny bit.

 

[TheBrumstead]

Another update - I started Wazine this morning. She ate some scrambled egg, pecked at some plain yogurt and some scratch. Now she's laying down most of the time unless you approach her, then she does stand and slowly moves. Comb color is her normal red. I did see her drink at least once. I just wish I knew for sure what was going on. I did see some droppings in the pen that are dark green/yellow that weren't there yesterday.

 

[TheBrumstead]

Lace update - Still laying down, no eggs from either today, did eat grass in the new grazing pen, did drink water, started on Poly-Vi-Sol. Here are a few pics, what do you think?

This is how she lays most of the time. I had to pick her up and carry her into the grazing pen. She did sort of stand and take a few steps a few times.


She isn't blinking here, she usually doesn't have her eyes open all the way.