Chiquitita2004
In the Brooder
- Mar 13, 2020
- 14
- 12
- 24
About a year ago my mother & I bought 4 chickens from a charity dedicated to rehoming birds (to the best of my knowledge our girls weren't full battery hens. They had some space to move around) we don't know exact ages but I'd hazard a guess they're around 2/2 and a half. They're standard egg laying chickens (Sussex x Rhode Island I think). My girl Arya (the ill one) is a bit lighter compared to her sisters (in colour) normally she is the bully & from what I've seen is top of the pecking order. She's normally very eager to run out the coop, she'll flap about when she is in etc but in the past 2 days she's been quite fluffed up, lethargic & I've had to get her mash (all my girls get layers pellets & oyster shells normally). It got to the point today that I got her into a box with straw in it, put water & some mash in bowls for her & left her a while. She drunk & ate (after a bit of encouragement). I then gave her a warm bath (with a pinch of Epson salts as the 'Back Yard Chickens' by Claire Woods said), towel dried her & placed her in a quiet, dark box for an hour before returning her to the coop. A while later I went in, saw she had laid (all my other girls have already laid today) & collected her egg, it was smaller then normal & has a large yolk and barely any white.
Her tail is drooping, she had some poo stuck to her butt feathers (I washed most of it off), she's still fluffed up and not moving much (she'll have a small wander about 1-3 m away from the coop but normally she's bolting around the garden, digging things up etc). Her eyes & beak are clear and theres no discharge. None of my other girls are any different. Nothing major has changed really apart from they're having more coop time (our fence blew down so we've put temporary measures in place but they have to be watched) but my mother has been home all week & they're out for at least 3 hours as they're normally used to (they have a large coop, I'm working on a run to add on). There's no trauma or injury & her poop seems quite watery/pale from what I've observed. In the past we've had chicken mite problems that I treated wih diatomatious earth (late last summer).
Any help that can be administered by me/from home would be great! Money's a little tight to go to the vet but I just want her to get better! Thank you for any help you can give!
(Pic 1 - her most recent egg)
(Pic 2 - Arya/How she's standing)
(Pic 3 - her comb)
(Pic 4 - how the combs on my other chickens look)
Her tail is drooping, she had some poo stuck to her butt feathers (I washed most of it off), she's still fluffed up and not moving much (she'll have a small wander about 1-3 m away from the coop but normally she's bolting around the garden, digging things up etc). Her eyes & beak are clear and theres no discharge. None of my other girls are any different. Nothing major has changed really apart from they're having more coop time (our fence blew down so we've put temporary measures in place but they have to be watched) but my mother has been home all week & they're out for at least 3 hours as they're normally used to (they have a large coop, I'm working on a run to add on). There's no trauma or injury & her poop seems quite watery/pale from what I've observed. In the past we've had chicken mite problems that I treated wih diatomatious earth (late last summer).
Any help that can be administered by me/from home would be great! Money's a little tight to go to the vet but I just want her to get better! Thank you for any help you can give!
(Pic 1 - her most recent egg)
(Pic 2 - Arya/How she's standing)
(Pic 3 - her comb)
(Pic 4 - how the combs on my other chickens look)
