urgent!! Wounded chicken--fox attack... UPDATE, new problem...

[purplepeep]

I'm sorry if this is a repeat post. I don't have time to search at the moment. My husband has just wrestled one of our hens away from a fox, and she is injured. I can't determine the extent of her injuries, because she is obviously scared and in pain, and is not thrilled about us handling her at the moment. As far as I can tell she has a bad limp, and lost a whole pile of feathers. I have her in the house, in a small cat carrier (so that she can't move around) laying on a folded towel. She is not making any noise, just laying there not moving. What should I do for her??? offer her food and water? I was thinking about making her a small bowl of oatmeal or something warm like that. Should I just let her be for a bit, and then examine her for wounds?? Any help would be greatly appreciated. We have already lost 2 hens to an eagle, and 2 more to the same fox......

 

[nnbreeder]

You are going to have to examine her and the sooner the better. just be gentle and keep her feet supported so it helps her feel more at ease.

If you have electrolytes give those to her. If not take some Gatorade or Pedialyte and dilute 50/50 with water and give to her. That will help with the shock. give this to her right away.

 

[PunkinPeep]

She may fight you no matter how long you wait, so you need to examine her sooner than later. Just have your husband help you by holding on to her to try to keep her calm. You don't want to wait and let a wound that needs attention go and get infected or something.

Give her a very thorough overall examination and make sure you know if she has any wounds and try to determine if there are any breaks. Then take pictures and let the wonderful veterans here help you when you know what you have.

Most importantly, take a deep breath. You can handle this. She needs you right now, even if she struggles.

 

[purplepeep]

Ok, we have taken a good look at her, (her name is Kentucky) and it seems that she has 2 small puncture wounds on her one leg. There is hardly any blood, and she is able to stand on it. We have cleaned up the area around the bite. I suppose now we will have to watch her for rabies, although the fox appears to have been in good health. Most of Kentucky's leg is bruised and swollen. I don't have any pedialyte or gatorade, so I mixed a pinch of salt and some sugar in warm water and gave her some with a syringe. She also ate a few spoonfulls of cream of wheat hot cereal. Poor little thing was falling asleep so I layed her down in the cat carrier and shut her in a spare room where it is dark and quiet. I will check on her again before I head to bed. I sure hope she makes it... poor girl!

 

[rosawoodsii]

Rabies is a disease of mammals, so I wouldn't be concerned about it with your hen. For the puncture wounds, Ledum 30C (homeopathic remedy) would be a great remedy.

One of my hens recently survived a raccoon attack--it came back for her THREE TIMES!--and she looked like she wasn't going to make it, but two weeks later she's running around strong and constantly improving. I treated her with herbal tinctures and homeopathy and no conventional treatments. I gave her soft foods and offered her Noni juice and water from a spoon for 4 or 5 days until she was ready to take more, and then I slowly offered her pellets, and finally, she started eating them.

It's amazing how wonderfully animals heal.

 

[purplepeep]

you know, I had no idea that only mammals could get rabies.

That's good to know! anyone know if I can put polysporin on her leg? Should I put some sort of dressing on it? or leave it be? Its not bleeding.

 

[Freebie]

When I had a hen attacked by a dog, I did not cover the puncture wounds, I cleaned them daily for a few days with a saline wash. and put like a triple anitbiotic ointment on them. she came out fine.

 

[lauralou]

I had a hen who was attacked by a coyote. Her wounds were pretty severe. I flushed them with a solution of hydrogen peroxide and water, then put neosporin on them. I only did the flush once, then reapplied the neosporin daily. I didn't even try to bandage the wounds, there were too many.

I've read that you shouldn't use the antibiotic ointment that has painkiller in it. I'm not sure if polysporin has that or not. I'm also not even sure if that's true, and why.

Good luck with your hen. I hope that she survives. I was lucky, and my little Ruby pulled through with the very minimal treatment that I gave her.

I did keep her in the laundry room until she recovered.

 

[purplepeep]

So Kentucky has been in the house in a dog kennel for 2 nights now, since her attack, and I have been letting her out every couple of hours to exercise her leg. She is walking on it with a bad limp... but at least she is using it. She seems to be in better spirits today--as she has finally eaten on her own, without me spoon-feeding her and she is drinking normally, both good signs I'm sure.

She had diarrhea the first 24 hours, I am assuming brought on by the shock of the whole ordeal, and that seems to be cleared up too. Here's the problem however. I was just getting ready to bring her back out to the coop for the day (I was going to bring her back in the house for the night) when I noticed a fresh poop full of crystals.... It looks like little cubes of glass....

anyone have any idea what this is??!! Is it something I need to be concerned about?? I am at a complete loss here....... TIA

 

[lauralou]

I've never heard of anything like that before. How strange.

How is she doing now?