Hi all, I have been using backyard chickens for a long to view others posts to try to diagnose my girl but I cannot seem to figure out the specific combination of my chicken's symptoms.
We are in an area without a chicken vet so doing this all on our own so any help is appreciated. She is one of my favorites and it is insanely painful to think about letting her go.
She is a 5 year old red star, about 5lbs and has always been active and eager to explore until early this week (3-4 days ago) when she became lethargic and not eating or drinking. Took her out of the coop and into a crate in the basement with fresh feed and water. She originally would only eat feed mixed with water but as of this morning she will not eat or drink anything and is more tired, slouching and closing her eyes. She has been notably pooping these watery/clear liquid poops with white urates and a couple black solids mixed in. She also has pooped brown slightly foamy diarrhea also with small lumps of black and chunks of copperish brown stuff. I read somewhere the black poop could indicate bleeding but still unsure as there seem to be solids as well as little chunks of brownish stuff throughout the poop as well that also lead me to think they are oxidized blood. I attached a photo of her poop 4 days ago but she is still pooping similarly liquidy poops however it is less yellow and more clear.
She laid a weird egg 2 days ago with what looked like an extra tube of hard eggshell lumped on the tip as if it were connecting off of it. I assumed it was some sort of reproductive infection due to that and the fact one of my Leghorns got lash egg last month-- I put her on amoxicillin 250mg twice a day as that cured my Leghorn.
However it has been 2-3 days since we started on the antibiotics and she has not gotten better, she is less active and more lethargic, refusing to eat or drink anything and puffing her feathers up and sleeping.
No other chickens at this time are exhibiting these behaviors and there are no signs of broken bones, injury or trauma.
My thoughts are it might be cocci-- however since she is not a young pullet and the poop is not bright red/like other cocci I am unsure if I should start Corid in addition to the antibiotics.
Another thing I researched was blackhead but I don't know what to do there.
Does anyone know what this could be/how to treat it, I appreciate insight as she really matters a lot to me.
We are in an area without a chicken vet so doing this all on our own so any help is appreciated. She is one of my favorites and it is insanely painful to think about letting her go.
She is a 5 year old red star, about 5lbs and has always been active and eager to explore until early this week (3-4 days ago) when she became lethargic and not eating or drinking. Took her out of the coop and into a crate in the basement with fresh feed and water. She originally would only eat feed mixed with water but as of this morning she will not eat or drink anything and is more tired, slouching and closing her eyes. She has been notably pooping these watery/clear liquid poops with white urates and a couple black solids mixed in. She also has pooped brown slightly foamy diarrhea also with small lumps of black and chunks of copperish brown stuff. I read somewhere the black poop could indicate bleeding but still unsure as there seem to be solids as well as little chunks of brownish stuff throughout the poop as well that also lead me to think they are oxidized blood. I attached a photo of her poop 4 days ago but she is still pooping similarly liquidy poops however it is less yellow and more clear.
She laid a weird egg 2 days ago with what looked like an extra tube of hard eggshell lumped on the tip as if it were connecting off of it. I assumed it was some sort of reproductive infection due to that and the fact one of my Leghorns got lash egg last month-- I put her on amoxicillin 250mg twice a day as that cured my Leghorn.
However it has been 2-3 days since we started on the antibiotics and she has not gotten better, she is less active and more lethargic, refusing to eat or drink anything and puffing her feathers up and sleeping.
No other chickens at this time are exhibiting these behaviors and there are no signs of broken bones, injury or trauma.
My thoughts are it might be cocci-- however since she is not a young pullet and the poop is not bright red/like other cocci I am unsure if I should start Corid in addition to the antibiotics.
Another thing I researched was blackhead but I don't know what to do there.
Does anyone know what this could be/how to treat it, I appreciate insight as she really matters a lot to me.
