Hello all, first time poster, long time reader. This forum has been so helpful in my start to raising a mini flock! To thank you all for that in advance. Now onto what finally drove me to post here…
The short and sweet:
My two 12 week old bantam silkies got pecking injuries from my older hens. Stevie had a decent wound to her neck and was moved inside to the brooding box. She was cleaned up and seemed stressed out for the first day. The next day Tommi got attacked and had a much smaller injury. She also got a bath and snuggles and put in the brooder box with Stevie. Day 2 we started reintegrating Stevie and now at one week post pecking she seems good as new (still not allowed to be alone with the Bigs tho). Now the problem is Tommi. Even though she had a much smaller injury she seems to be doing much worse. Was very lethargic and her claws were curling up. We finally force fed him some electrolyte/sugar water at the end of day 2. That seemed to perk her up a bit. She graduated to us dipping her beak in the water and she would drink on her own. So she seemed like she was making a turn for the better. However it’s now been 1 week and she is still very lethargic, not moving much, and not drinking without us dipping her beak. I don’t think she is eating either. Her pecking injury has healed. I’m keeping her vent clean because she’s not moving enough for the poops to clear off from her fuzzy butt. I’m not sure what else to do for her. She occasionally seems a little off balance when i set her down in the box. And two days ago when she was seeming better i set her down, she got a little off balance, and then she kind of threw her head and neck around, seemed almost seizure-like. Hasn’t done it since though. Is there anything else i can do to help her? Or is this just a wait and see kind of thing?
The long and dirty background:
i am a new chicken owner as of last August. I have 4x 1 y.o. Hens. Two color pack blues, one Rhode Island Red, and one novogen brown. I decided at the end of May to add in four more. I got 1 olive egger, 1 Easter egger, and 2 bantam silkies.
Now we started introducing the chicks to the hens by putting them in a pack and play in the Hens chicken run around 9-10 weeks. Around 10-11 weeks they came out of the pack and play during the day and got to interact with the Hens and then went back in at night time. The big girls definitely picked on the littles but nothing too crazy for about a week. The silkies (Stevie and Tommi) got picked on more since they are smaller. The olive and Easter girls now are with the hens almost full time, we put them in a nesting box at night and block it off to transition them to sleeping together. I’ve tried to do a nice and slow integration but I’m not sure it’s working. The olive and Easter seem to hold their own but they’re definitely still scared of the Bigs.
The short and sweet:
My two 12 week old bantam silkies got pecking injuries from my older hens. Stevie had a decent wound to her neck and was moved inside to the brooding box. She was cleaned up and seemed stressed out for the first day. The next day Tommi got attacked and had a much smaller injury. She also got a bath and snuggles and put in the brooder box with Stevie. Day 2 we started reintegrating Stevie and now at one week post pecking she seems good as new (still not allowed to be alone with the Bigs tho). Now the problem is Tommi. Even though she had a much smaller injury she seems to be doing much worse. Was very lethargic and her claws were curling up. We finally force fed him some electrolyte/sugar water at the end of day 2. That seemed to perk her up a bit. She graduated to us dipping her beak in the water and she would drink on her own. So she seemed like she was making a turn for the better. However it’s now been 1 week and she is still very lethargic, not moving much, and not drinking without us dipping her beak. I don’t think she is eating either. Her pecking injury has healed. I’m keeping her vent clean because she’s not moving enough for the poops to clear off from her fuzzy butt. I’m not sure what else to do for her. She occasionally seems a little off balance when i set her down in the box. And two days ago when she was seeming better i set her down, she got a little off balance, and then she kind of threw her head and neck around, seemed almost seizure-like. Hasn’t done it since though. Is there anything else i can do to help her? Or is this just a wait and see kind of thing?
The long and dirty background:
i am a new chicken owner as of last August. I have 4x 1 y.o. Hens. Two color pack blues, one Rhode Island Red, and one novogen brown. I decided at the end of May to add in four more. I got 1 olive egger, 1 Easter egger, and 2 bantam silkies.
Now we started introducing the chicks to the hens by putting them in a pack and play in the Hens chicken run around 9-10 weeks. Around 10-11 weeks they came out of the pack and play during the day and got to interact with the Hens and then went back in at night time. The big girls definitely picked on the littles but nothing too crazy for about a week. The silkies (Stevie and Tommi) got picked on more since they are smaller. The olive and Easter girls now are with the hens almost full time, we put them in a nesting box at night and block it off to transition them to sleeping together. I’ve tried to do a nice and slow integration but I’m not sure it’s working. The olive and Easter seem to hold their own but they’re definitely still scared of the Bigs.
