New to chickens - Need help diagnosing sick chicken

[CoopCognito]

Hi, there. We have just begun keeping chickens and have four in a back yard coop : 2 Golden Wyendottes and 2 Speckled Sussex. The Goldies are 14 weeks and the Speckleds are 12 weeks. One our Speckleds is not doing so well. She seems to be the "runt" of the group, in that she is smaller, even smaller than her sister of the same age. Her legs and comb are notably more pale than the rest of the girls and it doesn't seem to be turning red like the others. She also keeps to herself some of the time... not all of the time but enough that we've noticed a difference. We thought this was just a difference in personality at first, but over the past few days she has become lethargic, is keeping to herself more, and has a very strange look to her eyes. She keeps them sort of half-open most of the time, and is more frequently resting with her eyes closed. Her eyes don't look swollen, exactly, and we've checked for any "eye worms" after reading the forum here regarding possible sicknesses, but have found nothing. She just looks sort of sluggish and tired all the time. The feathers around her head look a little weird, as do her tail feathers; just a little scraggly and not quite right.
She is eating and drinking, but I noticed today that her poop is now a bit runny and greenish.
What should we do? Can we just consult any vet? Is there something we can do ourselves? What is the best course of action?

Thank you so much for any advice.

 

[Judy]

It's hard to say. She may have some internal problem. If she is at the bottom of the pecking order, I wonder if she is eating and drinking enough. Sometimes the one at the bottom gets run off from food and water at least part of the time. She could have worms, I guess, but they are a little young for that.

Many or most regular vets won't treat chickens, and are not really that familiar with them if they do agree to. An avian vet is hard to find and usually expensive. Some here do take their chickens to vets but probably most don't.

The poop could be from not eating and drinking enough. You could try separating her maybe twice a day for a few minutes and offering her food and water. Sometimes a second feeder and waterer helps. There are a number of nutritional boost type preparations that you could try; I've never used one and am not familiar with them. If you do try separating her, you could offer water with some vitamins in it, or just drip a drop or two of infant vitamin drops along the side of her beak and let her pull it into her mouth. The common brand is PolyViSol. Don't get the kind with iron (at least I've read here many times not to; I've never read why not.) For a food supplement, a bit of scrambled egg or leftover meat is good. They can eat most anything you do, other than chocolate. They can't even taste the hot in hot foods. Avoid a lot of salt, fat or sugar. They will love anything like a spoonful of last night's lasagna or tuna casserole.

Maybe someone else will come along wth other ideas. Meanwhile I'll give you some links for reference.

http://chat.allotment.org/index.php?topic=17568.0 (graphic poop pics)

http://chat.allotment.org/index.php?topic=17568.0 (worming discussion)