Very lethargic Astralorp

[goldlace]

we aquired a 7week old astralorp yesterday because we needed addtl chicken for our coop. we have 3 - 6 week gold lace wyandottes. the new chicken seemed to be very mellow yesterday and timid. however, she did drink, eat the medicate food and scratched in the sand; also looked to be eating grass and dandlions. however, she also spent a great deal of time just standing in one place, very puffed out - looks like she has no neck - eyes closed. today my husband came from school to find that she had not come outside, but was still standing in similar pose inside coop. he brought her outside and later found her laying on her side. he picked her up and she went back into the lethargice stance. a bit later, i did see that she was walking around and had moved under a bench we have in the yard w/the other 3 birds. it appeared that they may have just been huddling because of rain - though we do have a covered run. i brought her inside to check vent - didn't appear to be plugged, though she had a lot of white sticky poo under her feathers. any suggestions as to how to proceed? have seen comments that it could be worm related? if so, any recommends on meds? at first i was chalking it up to going through and adj phase - i got her from someone at work who has about 25 chickens. i did ask him this morning if he had given us a sick chicken, but he insists he grabbed the first one that he could and i tend to believe him to be an honest person.

 

[jprice2ndlt]

i had a wyandotte do the same thing. I found out she had round worm. I went to my local co-op and bought some stuff called pig swing. it cleaned all my chickens out. i know some people use wazine. i hope this helped.

 

[goldlace]

update - we did clean her vent, i don't think she has eaten/watered today. she was not plugged. just went out and check on her, still in the lethargic stance, but it looks like she took a poo, which is the same white - though not super watery - kind of looks like white out. she is just standing there in it, eyes close. will pursue the worm thing, but will have to manually give it to her. would worms make her appear to be this sick and cause such rapid decline? one main concern is our 3 wyandottes - are they at risk to this astralorp? i would certainly expect a pullet of this age to be acting like a chicken - just like our other very busy girls.

 

[goldlace]

chick died night of last post, in my hand. husband's further research says symptoms match avian enceph. any feedback?