sick chicken with big belly

[andreanar]

I'm sorry.

 

[Eggcessive]

Sorry about your hen. A necropsy might give you some answers. Sometimes I think that mycoplasma can be one of the underlying causes for egg yolk peritonitis, but E.coli traveling from the cloaca can also be a problem. Heredity is a big problem. You can contact your state vet to do a necropsy, or you can attempt one yourself at home just to view the organs and learn. Take pictures if you need any opinions. Here is some info on contacting your state vet and necropsies:
http://www.metzerfarms.com/PoultryLabs.cfm
http://naturalchickenkeeping.blogspot.com/2013/11/how-to-perform-necropsy-autopsy-on.html

 

[speckledhen]

Though mycoplamosis can be related to egg issues, mine are MG-free. Hens are prone to cancers and other reproductive malfunctions more than any other animal and in that regard, are most like human women.

Ascites related to these things is very, very common and these article excerpts illustrate why:

From the article:

http://www.nature.com/nrc/journal/v13/n6/full/nrc3535.html?foxtrotcallback=true

The domestic laying hen is the only non-human animal that spontaneously develops ovarian cancer with a high prevalence. Hens ovulate prolifically, and this has made the hen intuitively appealing as a model of this disease in light of epidemiological evidence that ovulation rate is highly correlated with the risk of human ovarian cancer. As in women, ovarian cancer in the hen is age-related and it is also grossly and histologically similar to that in humans. In both women and hens, the cancer metastasizes to similar tissues with an accumulation of ascites fluid. Some aggressive ovarian cancers in women arise from cells in the oviduct; this is intriguing because ovarian cancers in the hen express an oviductal protein that is normally absent in the ovary

And here:
https://reeis.usda.gov/web/crisproj...in-aging-and-aged-commercial-laying-hens.html

Non Technical Summary
Ovarian adenocarcinoma is the second most prevalent tumor found in laying hens (Goss, 1940). More recently (Alfonso et al., 2005) reported that approximately 45% of all aged commercial laying hens had tumors of ovarian or oviductal origin. Ovarian adenocarcinoma is the fifth leading cause of death in women (Jemal et al., 2007). In spite of the high incidence and severity of the problem ovarian adenocarcinomas are extremely difficult to detect and treat early. This is one of the reasons that there is such a high mortality rate associated with these tumors. Much additional basic and applied scientific discovery is needed to find ways to detect, treat and prevent this condition. The result of additional knowledge in this area could help to avoid pain and suffering in hens and women. The chicken hen is the idea model for this particular spontaneous pathology because of the large number of ovulations that she undergoes during her lifetime. No other animal model is as applicable to the study of this problem in poultry and women.

Flaxseed may help. I fed mine flax seed, but it didn't do much, though I did not do it regularly.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100504124740.htm

In the race to find answers about ovarian cancer, researchers now have something to cluck about. The researchers have been using the chicken as a model to study this deadly disease and have recently discovered that a diet enriched with flaxseed decreases severity of ovarian cancer and increases survival in hens.

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[wolvesarelove]

And depending on what color the fluid is, sometimes you can figure out what they are ailing from. Green fluid is liver disease, deepy orangy yellow is heart failure and clear to yellow is internal laying. If she is internally laying, you might also try a round of penicillin.

What’s a ‘round’ of penicillin and how much?