Weight Gain After Feed Change

[corliss]

About a month ago I had a vet out to the house to look at my six hens, one of whom had a respiratory problem. She examined each one and said they were all on the thin side, based on how prominent their keel bones were. Within two days I switched from Blue Seal organic layer food to regular Blue Seal layer pellets which they have free access to at all times. My question is, how soon can I expect to see a weight change? When I pick them up, it doesn't seem much different than it did. And all of them were tested for worms and the results came back negative so this isn't a parasitic problem.

 

[Saltysteele]

just like people, they won't put on a ton of weight in a couple days. give it a week or two, then examine them again.

i'm assuming in addition to checking the feces for parasites, you've also checked for lice and mites?

my turkey chicks (8 weeks now) were growing pretty slowly for a bit, so i checked, and sure enough saw some lice near the vent. dusted with sevin a week and a half ago, and they have increased half of their size in the last week and a half. the lice, as small as they were, just DRAINED them! just did my 10-day followup dusting of sevin today.

i've also cleaned out their coop, sprayed it with sevin thoroughly, and after letting it dry, gave new/different bedding (suspect it was straw that was infested with mice that led to the lice). i have also dusted everything with diatomaceous earth in the last week or so, after i noted the lice were gone.