Predator got my hen—kill her or wait until morning to better assess?

[LestersFlat]

She is lucky! I thought I was going to have to cull her when I saw her on the ground yesterday. And she is definitely giving me the stink eye which I also thought that was a good thing.

Can maggots grow in the wounds even though it is cold (teens and 20s at night, 30s during the day)?

Here is a photo of her sister, also from today. I agree, the hurt girl does look good, considering, but you can see what her tail feathers and wings used to look like on this girl. The injured girl only has one tail feather left! OUCH!

I hope you are right and that her droopy wings improve. It is, after all, only 24 hours from the attack. I would not look so good if I had been beat up so bad. I will try to do a better inspection tomorrow with help from my not-so-helpful-in-doctor-things husband.

 

[Johnn]

I hope everything goes good

 

[Shireshome]

yes maggots can survive because it isn't cold on a nice warm chicken. I have a story to verify it but it's too sad so I will only say trust me I know.

Don't forget to give her some oatmeal with warm milk and honey, she will love it and it will perk her up in no time.

 

[eggboy]

Your hen looks like she will heal in no time. I've had chickens that looked even worse after a dog attack. If there are wounds and not just father loss that could have complications though.

 

[Carolyn]

I had a dog attack a couple of weeks ago and my hen looked very much like yours. She hid under an inaccessible area of the deck and I was not able to examine her until the next day. Lost a lot of feathers, looked a bit dazed but did okay. I have had a lot of trouble with foxes in day light hours. The first was plucking the chicken in my back yard and did a very good job of getting about 50% of the feathers. The hen looked and acted like a zombie for a day or so but was not otherwise hurt. After that I had snatch and run incidence with foxes, all I found was a few feathers. One happened 10 am a few feet from my house, I saw it out the window and before I could get to the door a few feet away the fox had snatched my rooster and left only a few feathers, I couldn't even track which way he went.
There are a lot of similarities in some predator attacks and there are a lot of things generally true about specific predators but trust me, I have learned from experience that they do not always act true to pattern. Most importantly: Nocturnal animals get insominia and they get hungry in broad day light.
So was your predator a dog or a fox or even something else? Either way you need to take care of the predator problem or it will be back. Keeping them up for a few days will help with hawk attacks in some cases but I haven't had it discourage foxes. Dogs for me have always been random and unexpected attacks. Keep them in the safest environment possible will give you time to figure out what you need to do to protect them.

Glad she survived.

 

[6RandomBrownLayers]

Nice to hear she is doing better. Good Luck.