Sick Hen/flock

[JPadronMiami]

get some plastic water bottles fill em up and freeze them then add then to the water containers specially for the birds you still have outside, you can use the smaller water bottles and freeze them for the smaller containers, its been so hot and humid here lately its been the best thing I can do for my birds..... as well as put up a few fans facing down and towards the egg boxes, i covered the fans in hardware cloth in case the birds fly up on them to roost, it protects them and their feet. incidentally, i have a few smaller kiddie pools in the runs with fresh water and the chickens actually stand in the water to cool off their feet, keep us posted!

I added some big fans outside where I wet the ground. flock sitter doesn’t appear to have sick birds. Some are exhibiting all the symptoms you mentioned and others are showing 1-2 of the symptoms.

Sad news, I lost a 3 year old Rhode Island Red yesterday due 2 Heat Stroke (first time ever), we'd had a 104 degree Fahrenheit day the day prior, she was perfectly fine, weighed about 6 pounds, ate well, normal poop, good egg production, however when i arrived at the ranch yesterday I knew something was wrong with her, she was panting, wings away from her body, she seemed a bit disoriented, picked at her food, comb and wattles a bright red color, no poop issue, i picked her up to take her into the airconditioned family room, and she died during that process, the day prior she was perfectly fine, it took her in less than 24 hours, today I'm doubling up on the frozen water bottles to put in their water bins....Hope this helps you, and brings awareness to you and others that are reading this post, this heat wave is something serious...no joke, it has the ability to be fatal. the rest of the chickens seem fine as of this morning.

 

[John The Mailman]

Sad news, I lost a 3 year old Rhode Island Red yesterday due 2 Heat Stroke (first time ever), we'd had a 104 degree Fahrenheit day the day prior, she was perfectly fine, weighed about 6 pounds, ate well, normal poop, good egg production, however when i arrived at the ranch yesterday I knew something was wrong with her, she was panting, wings away from her body, she seemed a bit disoriented, picked at her food, comb and wattles a bright red color, no poop issue, i picked her up to take her into the airconditioned family room, and she died during that process, the day prior she was perfectly fine, it took her in less than 24 hours, today I'm doubling up on the frozen water bottles to put in their water bins....Hope this helps you, and brings awareness to you and others that are reading this post, this heat wave is something serious...no joke, it has the ability to be fatal. the rest of the chickens seem fine as of this morning.

Sorry to hear about your bird, I threw out as many frozen bottle of water as I could find in their favorite shaded spot and emptied my ice try in their water… this heat ain’t no joke.

 

[Bawkbok]

I'm sorry your lost a bird to heat stroke. They all struggle in this nasty weather so many of us are afflicted with. That's the best thing I've found works for us as well is frozen water bottles and fresh clean cool water, changed multiple times a day along with wetting down their run. Deep shade is critical and as many fans as you can provide. They still pant and wings out, but it's a huge help when they can stand and lay in cool wet dirt. It's been a life saver for us thus far. We were at 118 heat index yesterday. I was checking on them hourly especially with the ones that take forever to lay an egg. We had one on the nest for 4 hours yesterday in the heat of the afternoon from 4-7 PM. It was still 90 at 10PM with an index of 108.
My heart goes out to all the birds (and animals) suffering in this oppressive heat dome. All we can do is all we can do and hope it's enough.

 

[JPadronMiami]

Sorry to hear about your bird, I threw out as many frozen bottle of water as I could find in their favorite shaded spot and emptied my ice try in their water… this heat ain’t no joke.

thank yu John, what bothered me is that i didnt have a decent chance to try to revive her, the rest of the chickens were ok yesterday and this morning, it was already 90 degrees this morning at 7:00am, i changed their water, put in fresh frozen bottles, took the water hose and sprayed down the ground in the the runs, also hosed the tree branches that act as a canopy above the runs and coops, at least for a short while those wet branches and leaves trickle fresh water down into the runs as it would after a rain, also be careful with the ice block or ice cubes in their water, if the water gets too cold too quick it can also shock the birds in this heat, if you can manage it cool off the water gradually or at several intervals during the course of the day. No quick fix for this, all we can do is be vigilant and try to make them as comfortable and safe as we can, incidentally, when i checked in on them last night it must've been close to 8pm some of them were panting, wings away from their body, however not disoriented or lethargic, also noticed that the bigger heavier girls were the ones panting, the Jersey Giants, the RIR's and the Barred Rocks, these are heavier birds, the one that died was an RIR-good 6 pounds, however my lighter birds like the Leghorns, Easter/Olive eggers were better, I do have a group Im particularly impressed with, my Australorp's, they are nearing 7 years old now and are walking around and acting normal, they are a bit on the heavy side though, even little overweight which is also not good for them in any weather, egg production is a little low right now for them I attribute that to the heat. Thank you for checking in Joe

 

[JPadronMiami]

I'm sorry your lost a bird to heat stroke. They all struggle in this nasty weather so many of us are afflicted with. That's the best thing I've found works for us as well is frozen water bottles and fresh clean cool water, changed multiple times a day along with wetting down their run. Deep shade is critical and as many fans as you can provide. They still pant and wings out, but it's a huge help when they can stand and lay in cool wet dirt. It's been a life saver for us thus far. We were at 118 heat index yesterday. I was checking on them hourly especially with the ones that take forever to lay an egg. We had one on the nest for 4 hours yesterday in the heat of the afternoon from 4-7 PM. It was still 90 at 10PM with an index of 108.
My heart goes out to all the birds (and animals) suffering in this oppressive heat dome. All we can do is all we can do and hope it's enough.

Thank you, it bothered me that I couldn't do more in the short window of time I had to try to revive her, I'd had her 3 years along with the others in her group, not a problem otherwise with any of them, I have a little group of about 10 EE' and OE's feathering out in a grow out pen in my family room where I have ceiling fans and central air conditioning, they are almost fully feathered out, in the past I usually at this stage put chicks out in a run for short periods of time to acclimate them (kinda hardens them) and bring them back in b4 the other bigger birds go to roost. Haven't done this with this batch of chicks yet, i did start them on eating some of the herbs i give my bigger/older groups. Thank you for your post, Joe

 

[John The Mailman]

Sounds like it could be an upper respiratory illness. There's also a possibility these chickens are suffering from heat sickness.

Treat the respiratory sympotms with this antibiotic. https://jedds.com/products/amoxy-tyl?_pos=3&_sid=cb74b4579&_ss=r

Treat heat sickness by providing a cooling medium such as dampened soil to lie in or ice cubes to scratch in to cool the legs and feet.

Most important, give them all an electrolyte solution to drink. Per chicken, one cup of water with a pinch of salt and baking soda with one teaspoon sugar.

I received the Amoxy-tyl today I plan on treating the whole flock to be on the safer side. Do you happen to know if there’s an egg withdrawal for it?

 

[azygous]

Two weeks after the final dose.

 

[John The Mailman]

Two weeks after the final dose.

Thank you!