lethargic Buffington

[dadagin]

Hello,

We're new to chickens and new to this forum. We have a 6 month old Buffington who is extremely lethargic this morning. She will not stand up and will not drink water but she did eat a little crumble. She is also bobbing her head on a continous basis and gently moving her back end from side to side. We keep 5 hens in a small coop in the backyard. They have hay in the coop. Four of the hens are laying but we're not sure which one is not. Does anyone have any ideas?

thanks.

 

[dadagin]

All,

I've just been informed that our sick hen is a Buff Orpington, not a Buffington. As I said, we're newbies...

 

[purpletree23]

Did you check her vent (back end) to see if she is egg bound? Does she have any injuries? Are her eyes clear or cloudy? If they have hay in the coop she might have an impacted crop. Do they have free access to crushed oyster shell and grit?

Give her some scrambled egg or grapes cut into quarters (easier for her to eat) or some chopped up well cooked pasta (plain) and see if she is interested in that.

In my opinion I would clean out the hay and replace it with kiln dried wood shavings that you can get at your local farm store.

 

[dawg53]

I recommend that you visually inspect her for lice/mites, especially around the vent area.

 

[purpletree23]

Yeah....what dawg53 said!

I always forget something.......

 

[dadagin]

I'd like to thank everyone for their replies. I ended up taking her to the vet. She looked her over and found nothing obvious wrong with her. We put her on Baytril and almost immediately she began improving. By the second day she was pretty much back to normal. Now I have to deal with the fact that we have a chicken on antibiotics. Our vet told us that with most food-producing animals there is a proscribed amount of time that you have to wait after ending the antibiotics before you can resume using their output, but that there have not been enough studies on chickens. Officially, we're never supposed to use her eggs again. This seems rather drastic so I was wondering if anyone knows of a reasonable amount of time to wait. These eggs would be for our own consumption.

thanks.

 

[dawg53]

Baytril withdrawal time is 28 days according to poultrykeeper.com