Pro - Does anyone else's nest boxes get soaked in rain?

[CALNICK]

Help please

 

On cleaning our girls out yesterday we noticed Lily our legbar standing all hunched up and asleep and not interested in anything that we were doing which is so very unusual as she is into everything.

 

So we decided to put her in a cage in the house so that she would be in the warm as the temperatures have dropped recently, she was not very lively and was drinking, prior to going to bed ourselves she was awake and standing up.

 

When we came down this morning she was dead, heartbroken as she was a real character and just a year old.

 

Did we do right bringing her into the house?

 

Any advice welcome

 

Thank You

 

Calnick

[Chucky Mama]

Sorry to hear your sad news. Bringing her into the warm was absolutely the correct thing to do. Difficult to know what was wrong with her really without a pm and of course those are costly.

[Olly]

Yes, you did the right thing. I'm sorry to hear about Lily - unfortunately sometimes chickens just die for no obvious reason, and if she was feeling poorly it's quite likely that she hid this from you until she was feeling very ill, because hens are very good at this. They don't like to lose their place in the pecking order, and so they will carry on behaving normally even though they are not well.

 

A year old is not very old for a hen, but she could have had a heart problem or something else. If a hen is clearly not well, then it's best to separate them from the rest of the flock so they don't get picked on, and bringing her indoors is a good idea especially if it's cold, as then she won't have to expend energy on keeping warm. Sorry that she didn't make it, but you did the right thing for her.

[annettec]

Am so sorry to hear your news. Our Silkie died last year and went down hill very quickly , in fact went from being a bit quiet to dieing in the vets within 2 hours.

I too was really upset that it happened so quickly and I hadn't noticed that she had been unwell before , but as someone else has said apparentley they hide it to maintain their position.

It sound like you did exactly the right thing by keeping her in the warm and quiet.

RIP little Lily x

[CALNICK]

Thank you for all of your comments, we do feel better now as we thought that we may have done the wrong thing in bringing her indoors. It is sad as this is the third girl that we have lost in about 4 months.

 

Thanks Again

[The Dogmother]

Sorry to hear your news.

 

I have just picked up from you last post that you have lost a few hens lately - did they all die in a similar fashion?

[MadAboutChooks]

So sorry to hear about Lilly, RIP you certainly did the right thing in bringing her in. Hopefully your run of bad luck is over with. You gave her a good life!

[SusieB123]

So sorry to hear your sad news

[Plum]

I'm so sorry, so young

[snowcloud]

Roost in peace. Bringing her into the house was the right thing to do - she was warm and would have felt safe.

We lost one of ours recently as she had peritonitis... brought her in and she was looked after in the warm for her last couple of days. It's sad, but the other chickens can get a bit aggressive with poorly chickens too, so don't feel you did the wrong thing.