Pekin Hen - lost appetite, changed behaviour

[sample]

Drumstick (she is well loved, I promise - our family has a terrible sense of humour) is what we call a madam - doesn't like to be touched and absolutely will not tolerate being picked up, will happily come to you and be your friend for food but otherwise leave her alone and she's quite content. She is the bottom of our pecking order.

Pekin, not sure on age but joined our flock last year in November-ish.

Yesterday she was in the nesting box when we went to lock them up for the night, which is unheard of - we haven't seen her lay an egg or be in any of the nesting boxes since we got her. We picked her up and checked her vent, she had some stuck poo which we cleaned and trimmed away a few feathers that were in the way. Popped her on her perch (she has a lower perch separate to the others) where she has her own food dish but she wasn't really interested in food. Edited to add: the most noticeable difference was she wasn't trying to peck us at every chance she got, usually when we go to lock them up for the night she nearly tries to launch herself at you when you get too close and she didn't even attempt to peck us. We left her for the night thinking she was just off but ready to check back this morning. When I went in initially she hadn't eaten anything from her dish and she was still on her perch - which isn't unusual - but when Hubby went out to check on her, he found her stood in the corner of the coop doing nothing. We decided to remove her and give her an Epsom salt bath - she soaked for about 10 minutes and we managed to get her to have a nominal amount of food - she kept drinking from the bath so we also gave her some water. Put her in a cage on her own with some clean water and food for a few hours. Came back to check on her and it didn't look like she'd moved from the position she was in when I left her, so gave her another Epsom soak and read that calcium might help if she was egg bound (no visible signs of this although I'm no expert at what I should be looking at). Checked her vent, mouth, all over for lice/mites, feet, crop and all were okay - nothing seemed wrong/off, no smells or odours either. She went crazy for some scrambled eggs and actually ate quite a bit + some plain yogurt which I'd dosed with some calcium. I've been sat in the shed with her for about 2hrs, she's moved a little and eaten some more but is just not herself still and I'm really not sure what else to look for/do.

The rest of our flock is right as rain, we have one broody girl (who will not be hatching any babies this time round!) but otherwise everyone is seemingly happy/healthy.

No signs of trauma/bleeding etc.
Poops are slightly green but I assumed that could be grass (again, I could be wrong). Can take photos as she's been on a white towel today as we didn't have anything spare to put down for her otherwise.

If possible any recommendations for what to do next would be great - we can take her to a vet but if it's exploratory it'll be SUPER expensive and I'm not sure we can truly afford exploratory costs right now. Someone at the pet shop mentioned that perhaps she herself is going broody, but isn't doing the usual chicken brood of screaming at you if you come close - but I thought that seemed unlikely.

They have a secure shed with sugar cane mulch, which is currently damp because of the TERRIBLE weather we've had in Tassie, we are changing it out tomorrow though for fresh flooring material.


Thanks in advance for any help/suggestions.

 

[Eggcessive]

Since she has never laid an egg, and you are unsure of her age, she might have some sort of reproductive disorder or infection. Salpingitis is common. Cancer is also common after the age of 2 or 3. Is her crop empty first thing in the morning, and gradually filling with food during the day? Can she move around to get food and water right now? Is she overweight at all? How do her droppings look? Are the urates in her droppings typical white or are they yellowish?

 

[sample]

Sorry for the slow reply @Eggcessive - she was seemingly getting better so we held off on responding (she was getting back to being a madam, eating - albeit a small amount and drinking) but she's back to being off again today. She is still separate from our other girls.

She HAS laid eggs - we got a few from her when we first got her, but I've no idea if she is laying now (we have 16 girls and get anywhere from 5-11 eggs a day at the moment). She doesn't seem to be very interested in food and is drinking, but minimal. Droppings are still green in colour. Crop is empty but she's not eating a whole lot either (we've tried yogurt, scrambled eggs, her usual seed mix - willing to give anything a go food wise). She is moving, but not a lot - she's in a 3ft x 2ft enclosure and we've seen her walk from one end to the other but she immediately sits down afterwards. Definitely not overweight.

Photo of droppings attached - the brown background was from about 20 minutes ago so the most recent - the others are from the last couple of days.

 

[Eggcessive]

Do the urates look that yellow in person? That can indicate liver problems from a reproductive infection, cancer or water belly/ascites. The green is usually from eating too little. Egg, canned cat food, tuna, or ground meat can be offered in small amounts to tempt her to eat, but chicken feed or wet feed would be good for her. Unfortunately, many times we don’t know what is going on until after we lose them when a necropsy can be done to look at the abdominal organs and contents. Do you have access to any antibiotics such as amoxicillin or enrofloxacin?

 

[sample]

Do the urates look that yellow in person? That can indicate liver problems from a reproductive infection, cancer or water belly/ascites. The green is usually from eating too little. Egg, canned cat food, tuna, or ground meat can be offered in small amounts to tempt her to eat, but chicken feed or wet feed would be good for her. Unfortunately, many times we don’t know what is going on until after we lose them when a necropsy can be done to look at the abdominal organs and contents. Do you have access to any antibiotics such as amoxicillin or enrofloxacin?

Yes, they're quite yellow in person too.
I have checked her belly - the very little I know about water belly, I gave her belly a feel and check and it seemed "normal" and not water balloon-esque (which is what I've read about water belly).

I will try her on some tuna tomorrow and grab some cat food from the shop to give her a try on, too. She's fed this food (plus a little added wheat as we were told that Pekin's can basically starve themselves if they don't have wheat) but I'm happy to grab a small bag of pellets if that would be better.

We don't, but we do have a vet that will see chooks - so could potentially get some. Is there anything else we can do in the meantime if we can't get antibiotics?

 

[Eggcessive]

Does she feel well nourished, fat, or is her breast bone very prominent? Since her comb is red, she may be laying or laying internally which can result in masses of egg material know as salpingitis. I have seen ascites/water belly in hens who died, but did not appear to have a fluid filled abdomen. It could be early onset.

Since most chicken feeds have a mixture of available grains, there could be wheat in yours already. I don’t like to mess with the balanced feed diet. I would only try to give a little of the other things if she refuses to eat her feed. Adding a little water to it sometimes makes it attractive.

What is your location in the world? Here in the US we can get a few antibiotics (enrofloxacin 10%, sulfa drugs) for chickens online from sites such as Jedds.com and some others. Amoxicillin is very hard to find after the FDA made it more difficult this past year. Farm vets may be helpful if you have other animals.