Not sure if something is wrong.....

[ajaldridge]

Tulip is five or six months old. I noticed today she is spending a lot of time sitting down instead of up and running about with the other chickies. When I go up to her and convince her to stand she will and she'll walk around chasing the mealworm if I hold one out for her, however my finger tips are bruised from where she got my fingers as well as the mealworm. She eats and drinks when I put out their food. I give them fresh food two or three times a day, plus a few treats early in the morning and in the afternoon when my son comes home. She's not as interested in the treats but she will go after the mealworms. Her poop is normal, far as I can tell. No blood or broken bones, no missing feathers, nothing that I can see that is saying she is sick. She is just kinda sitting there kinda mopey. Doesn't interact with the other chickies that much and doesn't even run around from Big Red playing around like she use to. I don't really think she's sick but I don't know what's going on either. Anyone have any ideas???

 

[Kittymomma]

Sounds like the kind of thing you're going to need to watch closely--on again off again symptoms, and murkey ones at that are tough. Don't discount your feeling that something is off though. Like most "prey" animals chooks tend to hide illness as long as they can.

Nothing really comes to mind, mostley just posting tonight so I can check back tomorrow. I don't like to isolate if they're not getting picked on, but if you could put her in a large crate or small pen for 1/2 a day or so where you could tell for sure how much she's eating/drinking and if her poos are normal that might give you a starting point.

Has she started laying yet?

 

[ajaldridge]

She's been laying for a while now. However lately we've been getting a lot few eggs but with winter, colder weather, and not as much sun I expected that anyways. If she's still acting the same way I may have to try to isolate her for a bit. With me having Friday and Saturday off work I can do it at some point this weekend, in between cub scout events, painting the church, and we are working on a new coop and fenced in area. With us out in the country and all the wild animals and all we've been keeping them in a coop on the front porch at night. That way if something happens my mother can hear and come out with her shotgun, it's right by her window and she gets up early anyways so I don't have to worry about them getting rowdy and waking her up. We have two indoor cats though and I just know that bringing in a chickie for observation won't go over well, last time the chickie stayed in for a few hours and the cats spent the entire time eyeballing poor little Ollie like she was food.

 

[Yay Chicks!]

Could she possibly be eggbound? Does she look like she's trying to lay?

 

[ajaldridge]

Not eggbound that I can tell. That's the first thing I checked this afternoon. My sis thought I was nuts, I had her hold the chickie and hand feed mealworms while I checked her. Didn't go over to well with either of them. Nothing is changed with the food, no chance of her getting moldy food either, I checked that out really good. When do chickens get broody and how do you tell that's what it is??? I have no clue about this, what I know I remember from the last time I had chickens when I was about ten, over twenty years ago, and what I have learned from this website which has been really helpful.

 

[Kittymomma]

Hens that are starting to go broody tend to want to spend more time in the nest, not just isolate themselves from the flock. It's possible, but doesn't really sound like it to me and isn't as common this time of year anyhow. You should probably give her a really good going over when you bring her in. She might be carrying a parasite load--mites/worms/ lice and it's got her feeling run down and not up to running with the flock.

As far as the cat goes I haven't had problems with any of mine with adult birds, but I wouldn't trust yours since she'll be in kitty's territory and not feeling up to snuff. I've had good luck teaching cats some respect with a squirt gun or water filled spray bottle--kitty looks at birdie, kitty gets wet. They really hate it and will usually stalk off all offended and pretending that they didn't want anything to do with what they got squirted for in the first place.

 

[ajaldridge]

We keep a squirt bottle of water in the house for when the kitties act naughty. It works with one of them, but the other one just ignores it, she'll even jump in a tub of water and swim around. I'll have to lock her in a bedroom or something I guess. I'll go on and put her in the house when I get home and just leave her in my room without the kitties in my room until I get up from a nap. With me keeping my room pitch black during the day to get some sleep maybe she won't make to much noise.

 

[DaniLovesChickens]

One of my EE pullets acted like that and I was convinced that she was dying.

As it turned out, she's mostly blind. She was fatigued because she wasn't getting enough to drink in the heat with all of them pushing eachother. I think she was depressed as well. You might want to check. Look in her pupils carefully and see if there is any blue or white tint at all.

Each eye on a chicken works in a different way so if one has bad vision and it's the one that helps with vision for moving and farther away stuff then it makes sense that she may not want to get up and play with the others. She would still be able to see food (close up "eating" vision) with the other eye.

What's going on with your chicken sounded similar so I just thought I would throw my experience out there in case that's what it is.

I hope she's ok! Good luck!