Sick chickens with swollen combs.

[wjmiller]

I have been having problems with my hens for the last couple of weeks. They stop laying, won't eat or drink much or at all, if the hen eats she seems to have a harder time passing the food out of her crop, the hen becomes very inactive and just sits in the corner of the coop, their poop becomes very runny or stringy, four of my five hens now have swollen combs. All are still drinking and eating except for one hen that is really sick. I noticed this morning that the hen with the most severe symptoms had passed something that looked like the egg membrane with no shell or egg inside, another one layed a really thin shelled egg. I had another hen that showed the same symptoms, after three weeks she had lost alot of weight, and wasn't eating, so I had to put her down. I just want to know what is causing this so I can treat them. Nothing I looked up matched the symptoms.

 

[Alaskan]

Do they have access to oyster shells? (You said thin shell, so I thought maybe low calcium)

How are they doing now?

 

[wjmiller]

Yes they have access to oyster shell, I add some in everytime I feed them. The eggshells are normal now, the oyster shell really helped. They still have swollen combs, it's not really bad, it just looks like the comb is thicker than before, I don't think you would know it unless you watched the chickens closely. I don't know if this is something I should worry about or if its normal. The hen that was sick is better now, but she has not layed in almost two months, after passing the egg membrane, she seems fine but will not lay. The other hens are laying fine. I think it's either because of stress, we have a rooster with them and he seems to prefer her over the other, I'm thinking the stress might have caused her to stop laying, or I thought it might be the feed, but we feed them dumor crumble feed with oyster shell and grit added, the others are laying fine, so I don't think that's it. I hope that theres not something seriously wrong with her

 

[Eggcessive]

How old are they and what breed of chicken? Can you post a picture of the swollen comb? Many hens when they are new to laying, and even older will have a shell-less egg now and then. Most people don't see them because they are usually eaten by the chickens pretty quickly.

 

[Alaskan]

I would put some oyster shell in its own dish, and let them eat as much as they want when they want it.

My hens are odd, they seam to eat a giant amount of the oyster shell, then eat almost none of it for a few weeks, then repeat. I have a bowl just for the oyster shell.

But...I don't have any other guesses, about the hen not laying or the swollen combs.