SOLVED. Mourning, dark comb, dehydrated, no appetite

[Anna_0909]

We came home from holiday to find one of our hens very ill she died the next day..
Now the other hen in her enclosure has suddenly lost appetite, her comb has fallen to the side - a sign of dehydration I'm told; she drinks water, but she throws it up, if she doesn't keep her head up. Her comb has also gotten very dark red, almost purple.
She has also lost a lot of weight. She's now only weighs 1600g. And she sometimes just stands with half-shut eyes.
I cannot feel any abnormality on her - although her vent is very dirty.

I've given her ACV in the water, bread soaked in oil (ate about a third of a slice), scrambled eggs this morning (she ate half of it) and now some hummus with a bit of ibuprofen in it (~60g). She didn't touch it.

I'm afraid it's the same sickness as the other one. And I'm afraid she's mourning. We have experienced a loss of a hen due to mourning before. I don't want to lose her :'(

 

[seminolewind]

Hi, I would bring her in the house if it's cooler, and just try to keep giving her treats that she loves. Now, what would the 2 have in common? Food, water, something bad they ate? Who took care of them? Are you sure they had water and feed and had access to shade-every day? I hope you can verify that. Also, sometimes people think that if food is too old or moldy or bad for them to eat, it's okay to give to chickens. How long were you gone? How many chickens do you have?

 

[Anna_0909]

Thank you for your answer! The climate here is pretty cool, so the temperature hopefully suits her just fine (atm 22c day and 14c night).

I tried giving her rice, which she loves. She pecked at it, dropped it, threw up some water when trying to pick up the rice.. Also her poop is almost only water(!).

We were gone for a week. The one who's now dead wasn't at her best, when we left. We thought it was because of the heat wave at that moment. The other one, Frigg, was healthy.
My sister took care of them and our 6 other hens, who live in an enclosure right beside them. My sister visited them every 2nd day, making sure they had food and water. Both the food and water bowls were almost full, when we came home, even though my sister went on her own holiday 1-2 days earlier. Anyway, my sis lives 20 minutes away by car, so it's unlikely she would bring scraps.

And yes, both have access to shade. The enclosure is a combined coop and run, with the coop being above the run and thus providing shade.

 

[Anna_0909]

Update.. We went to the vet with her. She had a gut disease, not uncommon amongst hens, said the vet. The disease is highly contagious, and in her condition, we had to put her down, to avoid her infecting out small chicks

 

[seminolewind]

I'm so sorry. Thanks for updating.

 

[Anna_0909]

Thanks - you did what you could.

It is possible to buy a treatment against it - but it's quite expensive (~$180 for 1L).
Frigg was too weak and the risk of infecting the others was too great. At least now we know how to react, if we ever see similar symptoms. But now, we'll clean and sterilize everything, they were in contact with.