Why is my chicken far sighted? She sees fine except very close, so she has trouble foraging, but not eating food in a feeder.

[Lortiz]

I have a ten week old cream legbar chick who seems to have a near vision problem. She has trouble picking up food if it is sparse. I noticed it when I give them weeds and veges. She pecks at them and usually misses. If she does manage to get a piece but drops it she tries but can't pick it up because she misses the target. Same thing with worms unless I have a handful, which she gulps down voraciously. If there is a bunch of food, like in the feeder, she pecks and eats fine because she doesn't need to be as accurate. She doesn't seem to have any trouble at all with seeing anything else. She is able to fly onto the roost and other things fine and she navigates fine when she runs around. I am wondering whether this is genetic, a hatching problem, or a nutritional deficiency. All of the other chickens are fine and healthy. Also, I read the article about chicken vision that says chickens use one eye for near vision and the other for far vision. So I am wondering if this indicates that she has a problem only with her near vision eye. Her eyes look normal. Any advice or info is much appreciated.

 

[cavemanrich]

As I started reading your post, I was already thinking of linking the chicken vision article. You did get to it, so I no longer need to.
Here is my view of situation. Chickens are like all other living things. This includes us humans. None of the living things in our world are EXACTLY PERFECT. You do notice that many people these days do wear corrective eye wear. Before glasses were invented, certain people were not able to see that well.
The same thing can be related to other animals , including chickens. Unfortunately there are no glasses for chickens, so they will have to do the best they can, with what they have.
On a sidenote, one of my chickens years ago was attacked by a neighbors dog. She did make it thru, (recovered) but as a result, was blind afterwards. She still lived an additional 2 years. I did have to keep her somewhat separated, and offered individual feed and water. I'm not sure how she did find the food, but maybe with sense of smell. Feed and water was inside cage to protect her during the day.
WISHING YOU BEST,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, and

 

[Lortiz]

As I started reading your post, I was already thinking of linking the chicken vision article. You did get to it, so I no longer need to.
Here is my view of situation. Chickens are like all other living things. This includes us humans. None of the living things in our world are EXACTLY PERFECT. You do notice that many people these days do wear corrective eye wear. Before glasses were invented, certain people were not able to see that well.
The same thing can be related to other animals , including chickens. Unfortunately there are no glasses for chickens, so they will have to do the best they can, with what they have.
On a sidenote, one of my chickens years ago was attacked by a neighbors dog. She did make it thru, (recovered) but as a result, was blind afterwards. She still lived an additional 2 years. I did have to keep her somewhat separated, and offered individual feed and water. I'm not sure how she did find the food, but maybe with sense of smell. Feed and water was inside cage to protect her during the day.
WISHING YOU BEST,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, and

Thank you so much! I think she will do fine as long as she is close to feed and water when she is out foraging. I'm glad your girl did well with your great care.