Sick Hen / No Obvious Injury

[FreshAir]

We have a 7-8 month old Rhode Island Red that my son adores. This morning, we let her out and she was acting like she was drunk — very wobbly. We wondered if she had a hurt leg/foot, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary. She was fine the day before. We checked her out and there were no signs of trauma or injury. She hasn’t laid any eggs to date and doesn’t appear to be egg bound. She also wasn’t squawking like she normally does when we are outside. She pooped once (I think) while I was holding her and it looked quite loose (projectile). We did give our hens some ground up chicken (raw) and some sour cream that we weren’t going to eat, but that’s really the only change/new entries to their diet in the last few days. The other hen appears to be fine so far. I don’t believe she was vaccinated; we got her from a gal near us who had chicks, and I didn’t know to ask (as we are new to this). She appears to be super lethargic tonight and wasn’t able to get back into the coop on her own. We offered some electrolytes and she had a sip, but I didn’t see her eat anything at all today.

We are so sad to see her like this and my son is devastated his girl is hurting. Any ideas what this could be or remedies we could try if she makes it through the night? Thanks for the help!

 

[Razzlefrazzle]

Being wobbly is probably either from being weak or possibly a neurological problem. I don't feed my birds raw meat because of the risk of salmonella and other pathogens, but it's hard to know if that is the problem here. What is their normal diet?

Is she a normal weight compared to your others or is she lighter/has a prominent breast bone? I'm assuming her crop feels pretty empty because she hasn't been eating? If so I'd encourage her to eat by offering her a wet mash of pellet food. If she is really not eating at all you may need to tube feed or syringe the mash into her.

Pictures of the hen and her poop might be informative if you can add some.

 

[ChickenHeartedHen]

Huh. Feeding chickens some chicken.. that’s a new one.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

Chickens love to eat chicken-and turkey. Add to that any fish or meat. If they found a deer carcass in the woods, they would likely eat some.
That is what omnivores do. Just saying.
I do cook all the meat I give them though. Nothing fancy, just to kill bacteria.