Unusual Chicken Deaths *warning this thread may be disturbing to some users

[TOPChickens14]

I went out to the coop this afternoon and I was shocked by what I saw. Right there in the doorway was a deceased chicken. Somehow my chicken slipped on the bar that they use to get into the nest box. At the corner of the inside of the nesting box, there is a 2-inch space. she slipped on the bar and her head stayed in the box while the rest of her body was outside of it. With her head on one side of the space while her body on the other, her neck fit right into that space. Since her head couldn't fit through that 2-inch space, I am guessing that her body weight pulling down on her made her head try to squeeze into that space because she was stuck there. It was almost like she was hung. It is so sad. I can't imagine the odds of this happening. She had a very unique personality and I am sad that she had to go and not another more normal one.
I thought maybe other people have had chickens die in unusual ways and it would be interesting to hear about them. Please try not to post photos of your deceased chickens. I don't want this to be too disturbing for people.

 

[azygous]

I'm so sorry you had to have this dreadful experience. Dead chickens are a fact of life, even though a very unfortunate feature of chicken keeping. If your intention is to show us what can happen to a chicken when we fail to identify a hazard such as you describe, a photo can add more dimension and gravity to the image we try to muster in our minds.

The second part of your warning would carry a lot of weight if you would describe how you fixed the hazard that killed your favorite hen, along with a photo of the repair.

Years ago, I had noticed metal strapping holding a perch in my run to the support was missing a screw and gaping. I had gone to town for the day and had my neighbor stop in to check on the chickens. As luck was in my favor that day, she stepped into the run just in time to discover an older hen upside down dangling from that perch with her foot caught in the defective strapping. She freed the hen with no serious consequences for the mishap. I immediately upon hearing her report fixed the loose strapping.

Your thread can be a valuable reminder to us all not to put off fixing hazards that we note in passing but seem not to get around to fixing until there's an incident.

 

[rosemarythyme]

I had a 6-7 week old chick die after getting a toe stuck in a crevice between where the coop and run extension of a prefab fit together. Looks like she panicked and thrashed herself to death.

We're cautious about checking for gaps now in every part of the coop and run and making sure there's not any obvious small gaps that a chicken toe or foot could slip into again.

 

[aart]

Had a 6 week old chick get it's head stuck in chicken wire over 2x4ww.
I assume it panicked and broke it's neck.
I replaced chicken wire with 1/2" HC.

 

[Peas4Ducks]

This chicken didn’t die, luckily, but I recently found our Welsummer wedged into a gap between the porch stairs and the foundation of the house. She was worked in there so that she couldn’t move forwards or backwards. She was standing on soft ground so I was able to dig her out, and then blocked the gap with stones, but geez…

 

[TOPChickens14]

I drilled a small board into the space that her neck got stuck in. I hope that nothing like this ever happens again.