Lethargic bird

[LIsaajb]

Yesterday evening I noticed one of my birds sleeping in the yard while her sisters foraged. She kept her feathers puffed up and seemed to hold her rear end high. She's been showing this same behavior again all day. I checked, but I do not feel an egg around her vent. She gobbled up a piece of clementine I shared with her, and took 2 beak fulls of water when I brought it to her, but isn't moving much. What can I do to help her get back on her feet?
Tia!

 

[big mami]

She sounds like she is going broody, and has picked an odd place to decide to nest. You could move her on to a nest in the coop, on a couple of eggs (or not), and see if she stays. If she stays and squaks when you try to remove the eggs from under her, she has gone broody. Congrats! You can either "break" her broodiness (look for info on that on this forum), or put fertilized eggs under her and let her raise babies. Best of luck!

 

[LIsaajb]

I'm not sure that she's broody. She did not lay today, and when I put her in the coop because it was raining, she did sit on the nest. But she did not care when I picked her up to bring her in the house. I gave her some olive oil and she's having an epsom salt soak right now. Hopefully it helps.

 

[LIsaajb]

After the "spa treatment" she ate some of the food I brought her and pooped! I'm taking both of these as good signs. And she keeps trying to fly out of the box she's drying off in. As soon as her feathers are dry we'll put her back outside.

 

[big mami]

By the way, broody hens don't lay eggs. When they stop bring broody, they go back to laying. So it might still be that she is broody. Just a guess...