Quote: Sorry for the late reply!
Sunburn, I don't know about, I'm in Australia and we've been though some scorchers so hot nothing moves and you could fry an egg on the green leaves in the shade... Yet our poultry have never had a sunburn.
However I noticed you said you're in the UK(?) One thing I have noticed is some severe discrepancies between disease and parasite (etc) problems and treatments between countries. Some things from Australia simply don't apply to America but we're a lot closer in compatibility than the UK; some UK problems are simply not paralleled by what we are experienced with. So for all I know, your birds do have sunburn....
There's a site you should check out for people in your area who may be more relevant with their answers:
Quote:
But this site, BYC, also has people from your area which can also help. It would help if you edited your profile to state that you are from the UK, and search this forum for people from that area too.
You will often be asked on this forum where you are located and it's very relevant to many problems; people often cannot give you a relevant answer without that information. The differences are that great. There are some diseases unique to each country, and some variations of diseases and parasites each country has do not pertain to all other countries. And treatment methods vary quite widely too.
Quote: Regardless of all the helpful videos you can see and tips you can get, nothing helps as much as hands-on experience.
Just practice restraining them, find out what works for you. If you're calm and firm in what you are working to achieve they will for the most part respect and trust your interactions with them. Intent counts for a lot. They have to learn to put up with being handled too, it's often necessary for their own good. Once they learn you don't mean them harm, they will calm down; some birds will never accept being handled but it's not fear based, it's simply anti-human sentiment. They don't like people, and that's all there is to it, with those individuals.
I found the best methods of restraining them involve catching them as quickly as possible and stopping them fluttering and struggling as soon as possible, because they get stuck in a repetitive pattern if every time they are chased or caught, they are allowed to run and flail around for long periods. If you stop them early they learn to settle early. The longer it goes the more hysterical they can get, and in their minds it becomes bullying or hunting. It's very important that however the interactions start though, they always end calmly and positively, which has more to do with how you release them than with what you did to them. For that purpose I often keep treats on me so they can learn to associate being wrangled with something good.
Since you say your hen has apparently forgiven you, I'd say you're already doing just fine and the rest is all just practice and refining technique.
I use one hand to hold their legs if they're not calm, or support their bodies if they are, and with the other hand hold their wings to their bodies in the normal folded position. To check inside their mouths or forcefeed them something I put them on my lap, sitting them on one leg, facing the same direction as I am, and use the arm on that side to tuck them against my side, and use that same arm that's holding them there to cradle their head from behind and then use that thumb and index finger to open their mouth at the corners of the beak, on the sides, and than I use my free arm to administer whatever I am administering. Practice makes perfect.
You can tell jaundice also by looking at their faces unless they're already yellow skinned, or if they're dark skinned.
Quote: Not necessarily unlikely, unfortunately, as beyond genetic bias there are dietary causes. Generally all birds in a flock are on the same diet, so often if one bird in a flock develops organ failure at least some others will too; digestive problems account for the vast majority of poultry deaths and of all of these, almost all of them are disorders involving the liver; it's more common than not in terms of cause of death.
Any birds fed processed feeds, but especially high production breeds, are fairly common cardiovascular disease cases, but renal disease is also fairly common. When we force them to take, as their staple food, only cooked/overprocessed and often synthetic fats, oils, and proteins, such as pellets are comprised of, we are feeding them the exact diet known to cause heart disease in all animals fed on it. Some just cope better than others. If they're free ranging chances are they'll be doing much better than average.
All that said, I wouldn't think offhand it's organ failure but that said, I wouldn't rule it out, either. Helpful, I know. :/ Sorry. Photos really do help but they can be quite the ordeal for non-techy or experienced people to get online.
Quote: If you want information on anything about poultry, the easiest way to find it may be to google it, and chances are the links provided will bring you straight to any relevant threads on this site.
There are search options within this site, but I find them unreliable and it's often better to search outside of the site.
Don't worry about finding worms in their poop; an absence of worms in the poop doesn't mean they don't have worms, just that the worms are either not breeding right now, or the eggs are too small to be seen easily. If you haven't been worming them then worms would be a good bet. Liver fluke can cause symptoms like liver failure. With some of the worm species you will only see adult worms in their poop after something has killed the adult worms. Also, many wormers don't kill the whole spectrum and those that used to, after years of overly heavy usage, no longer kill any of them. There are some areas where you may as well pour the wormer down the drain for all the good it's going to do you now.
To be very sure about worm absence or presence you'd need a fecal egg count. Some vets do that, for a fee. I personally find it better to worm them regularly, but using natural alternatives instead of chemicals. Not many people know that carrots are a great wormer. They're too high in fiber and vitamin A for parasites to stomach.
For poultry you'd need to grate them though. But they also work on kids, dogs, and so forth.
I use natural wormers, just added to their food, like black pepper, cayenne pepper, tabasco sauce (I usually give that one on bread), herbs and the Allium family like raw onion, garlic, etc, to worm mine, and have never had worm problems.
That said you wouldn't want to let a very advanced worm problem reach the near death stage and then try the gentler natural alternatives, and I wouldn't want to advise anyone who is a newbie to herbs on what harsher natural alternatives they could try, as some can be fatal if overdosed, i.e. the wormwood plant. If you are familiar with herbs or feel confident you can find the relevant information on dosing with them, by all means look into what you feel comfortable using. It's not really hard but some are quite worried about it.
Raw garlic is high in natural sulfur compounds and if you feed it regularly it builds up in their systems and acts as a disease and parasite repellant. It's also a very powerful natural multi-spectrum antibiotic which is more powerful than the most powerful artificial/man-made antibiotics against food poisoning and viruses etc, as tests in patients in hospitals have proven. It's antibacterial, antiviral, antiparasitic, antimicrobial, and the list goes on. But for parasite control it's better given as a staple, not a random once-off additive.
Quote: Impaction is a definite possibility. Especially with grass cuttings it could produce the symptoms you described.
No doubt you know the reason why grass cuttings are a 'no-no'; I think the same reason applies to poultry. Some animals perhaps have some ability to process the cuttings' gaseous byproducts better than others, and thereby don't die from it. Some do, some don't, it sure is random.
Best wishes.
