Please help!

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3HenMama

3HenMama

Hatching
5 Years
Aug 17, 2014
9
0
7
I am a new chicken owner and am in desperate need of advice!
I have three beautiful hens – a Barred Rock, Pippa, a Rhode Island Red, Ginger, and an Easter Egger, Paisley.
All my girls are 7 months now and Pippa and Ginger have been laying faithfully for about a month now. But my poor Paisley has had nothing but problems! She started laying about a week after the others, but only laid softshell or no shell eggs. Then about every 4 days she started to lay normal eggs. Last week I found her on Thursday with a prolapsed vent and egg all over her vent feathers. I cleaned her up and placed her in quarantine, where she laid a normal egg on Friday. She was placed back with the other girls on Saturday. It has been 8 days since she laid an egg, and I am scared that she is egg bound. However, she is showing no typical signs of this. She is eating, walking and acting normal. She is not lethargic and her tail feathers are not down. She does often go into the coop in and lay in a nesting box, but lays no egg. Her waddles have turned white.
So my question is – has anyone ever dealt with this before? Does she have some sort of deficiency that causes her to have this problem? I have researched this for days and found nothing helpful and I am in desperate need of answers!!! Thank you!
 
Welcome to BYC
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Glad you joined us! I'm so sorry to hear about your hen's problems. Another member here recently wrote a good article on diagnosing and treating egglaying problems and there is another article on egg problems, such as soft-shelled specifically, I'll link them both for you:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/egg-binding-symptoms-treatment-and-prevention

https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/common-egg-quality-problems

Best of luck with her!
 
I'm no expert (actually a relative newbie myself), but from our experience I can tell you that each pullet follows her own path when starting to lay! We have had some who have laid perfect eggs, 5-6 per week, from the moment they started laying. We had one who dropped softshell eggs from the roost for the first few days, then took a couple days off, then kicked into gear with good eggs laid in the nest box. One of our newest pullets, a golden comet who is almost 6 months old, has laid two tiny, yolk-less eggs (first one on the ground and second in the nest box) in the past two weeks, so we are still waiting to see what her "normal" will be. What we have learned is to be patient while they go through "puberty" - they'll get the hang of it soon!

Good luck with your girls.
 
Welcome to BYC!
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We're glad to have you.

Sorry to hear your about your bird!

Best wishes to you and your chickens.
 
Hello there and welcome to BYC!
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So sorry about your bird. Pullets can have a lot of trouble at first when they start laying. So make sure they are all on layer feed and have oyster shell on the side.

Definitely read the article on egg binding. It has easy step by step instructions for treating and to help preventing it from happening again.

I sure hope she can get past this and stay a happy healthy girl. :)
 
I forgot to mention they are all on organic layer feed and have been since 18 weeks. They also have oyster shell available for them in their run. Still no egg today
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Welcome to BYC! Glad you decided to join our flock. I'm sorry about your hen's laying problem. You've been given some good advice by the other members and some good links by sumi. Please feel free to ask any other questions you may have. We are here to help in any way we can. I hope your hen recovers soon. Good luck.
 

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