Moving roost

[lostfan1]

My Hen is 8 years old. She is my only chicken. She’s like a pet. I need to move her roost closer to the floor. Will she be ok with that like will she know where to roost? Right now it is about 4’ off the floor. She can’t jump up and down like she used to. I want to move it maybe 1” off the floor or maybe lower. I don’t want her on the door sleeping. Last time she was covered in mites. Yes I’ve treated her and the coop and is all good. She’s been inside my home until I fix her roost.

 

[rosemarythyme]

Depending on how high everything else is in your set up, no reason you can't move it lower. Is 1' manageable for her?

 

[lostfan1]

Depending on how high everything else is in your set up, no reason you can't move it lower. Is 1' manageable for her?

The more I think about it I don’t think so. She’s having trouble jumping up on things. She likes to jump on my back I know she couldn’t so I was almost laying flat but not quite and she couldn’t do it. Let me tell you the whole story and maybe you can help I hope. About 3 weeks ago she seemed fine. She jumped up my husbands back which she loves to do. He slowly stood up which is what I do also but she lost her balance and fell face first onto the payment. She had trouble getting up. I helped her get back on her feet. Ever since then she has been off balance. She slept in the bottom of the hen house (she’s the only chicken) she was covered in mites. Her balance for worse. I bathed her up really good cleaned
coop Out put some stuff in to kill anything left for bugs. She’s been inside My house ever since in spot I made up for her. I looked at her feet and think she has Bumblefoot. I soaked a couple times and tried pick it off. Not sure if I succeeded or not. I got some off. She’s still off balance a bit but I think it’s her feet. By the end of the day she’s limping. I need to move her out of the house and back into the coop but need to move the roost. Tell me what you think please. She’s like a pet some people can be mean please don’t be mean. I do the best I can. If she was suffering I would put her down. But I don’t think she is where she is eating and drinking

 

[rosemarythyme]

In that case you can try moving/placing a super low roost and see if she'll take to it, but she may not want to roost at all so she might opt to stay on the ground or in a nest box. I have a special needs bird that currently only roosts about 50% of the time, so we manually place her on it each night. We tried giving her a very low (4") roost but she won't stay on it or voluntarily use it, so she gets a boost onto her preferred roost instead.

Also post photos of her feet if you think she has bumblefoot so we can take a look at that.

 

[lostfan1]

In that case you can try moving/placing a super low roost and see if she'll take to it, but she may not want to roost at all so she might opt to stay on the ground or in a nest box. I have a special needs bird that currently only roosts about 50% of the time, so we manually place her on it each night. We tried giving her a very low (4") roost but she won't stay on it or voluntarily use it, so she gets a boost onto her preferred roost instead.

Also post photos of her feet if you think she has bumblefoot so we can take a look at that.

 

[lostfan1]

I appreciate all your help. Here are two pictures of her feet. I had to black out my face I didn’t want to scare anyone .

 

[rosemarythyme]

That does look like it could be a bumble on the "palm" of the foot.

Things to have on hand to try and remove this: some sort of vet wrap, plenty of paper towels or gauze, clean pair of tweezers, neosporin, sterile solution/vetricyn (optional, but I like to keep rinsing it when I work). Do a 15-20 min soak in warm/hot epsom salt bath, then use the tweezers to dig at the scab and try to remove it. If it comes off, remove anything else underneath that doesn't look like soft healthy tissue (like yellowish clumps, which would be pus). If it bleeds, use the gauze or paper towels to staunch the flow until it's under control. Once you get it cleaned out, apply some neosporin, then bandage the foot with the vet wrap.

Repeat epsom soaks and bandaging daily for the next few days. Once the wound looks like it's starting to heal up, I stop bandaging. Healing time will depend on the severity of the bumble.

 

[lostfan1]

Ok thank you I will try that. Thanks for your help!