Swollen like stomach?

[Hennyhandler]

When I picked up one of my hens today I picked her up different than I normally do and felt her stomach. It was puffy. I picked up the others and some had this though not as much and some didn't. Was this like an egg or what?

 

[Chotii]

You don't say what part of the "stomach" was "puffy". Do you mean the crop, down low on the chicken's neck/breast, where food is stored before it is digested? Or the abdomen between/behind the legs?

A hen's abdomen can become genuinely swollen and taut from infection (such as from Egg Yolk Peritonitis), but if that's true the hen will be listless, reluctant to rest/lie down/will stay standing all the time, and eventually stop eating.

A hen can be egg-bound, but again will be miserable, straining, hunched. I don't know that 'puffy' is a symptom.

Perhaps some of your hens just have more flesh on their bodies? If there were an egg causing the "puffiness", then if you felt the same hen later after she had laid her egg, you would notice the difference. So you might want to check them later.

 

[speckledhen]

Could be an internal infection or fluid filling her abdomen, if its really the abdomen.

 

[wordgirl]

When you say stomach, do you mean in front of her legs or behind? I think good layers (and after they've been laying for a while) are supposed to have soft, palpable abdomens. I think some (or all) or our hens have a squishy (if you'll pardon my use of that word

) area behind their legs – I think that's the abdomen ????

 

[Hennyhandler]

Sorry about that. I mean between the legs.

 

[bubblebean11]

Is the comb turning purple and is she having a hard time walking?

I had a pullet do that right before she was supposed to lay and I took her to a vet that was a ways away and $115 later I went home with no chickie. It was aweful, she had fluid in her bottom area and they checked it out and she had cancer. I dont want to freak you out, it is just what happened to me. I pray that no one else has to go through that.