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

[Pottage]

One of my girls has been behaving really oddly over the last few days. She'll be fine one minute, wandering around and feeding but the next she'll stand still all hunched up and keep closing her eyes with her wings all dropped down. Her head seems to be almost constantly pulled into her body, like she has no neck.

 

They are all being wormed at the moment with Marriages Flubenvet pellets, which she isn't keen on at all and ignored for the first day or so, but I've got her to start taking them by adding warm water so they are soft. She isn't off her food, but isn't eating like the rest of the girls. She laid a softie about a week ago, and has been laying weak shelled eggs since then, and promptly eating them. I don't know if yesterdays and todays were softies because by the time I let them out in the morning (5:30am) she's already laid and all I find is a sticky mess in their bedroom.

 

She started behaving like this Sunday (Flubenvet started Friday). I took her out of the run and kept her in the kitchen with me and gave her a warm bath which induced a really watery poo. Her poos are normal now, and her abdomen doesn't feel warm or hard (she laid this morning). I felt her crop when I got home tonight and it didn't fell very full and wasn't as firm as the other girls, but after she's eaten some of the pellets this evening its firmed up a little. It isn't hot to the touch as you would expect with sour crop. I'm fairly sure it is completely empty in the mornings, but will check for sure tomorrow. She sneezes quite a bit, but they all do and have been doing so since we got them 4 weeks ago. None of the others are behaving like her. Usually when we got outside they all come running to se us, but she just sits there in the corner of the run looking sorry for herself. She's stopped making any noise since she's been under the weather, but she's usually one the loudest. I have noticed that when she lays, and for a good while before (at least 1/2 an hour), she discharges clear watery liquid from her vent that definitely isn't poo every so often. Her face is also a lot redder than any of the other girls, too.

 

They were treated two weeks ago with Ivemectin, I left it a week before I started on the Flubenvet.

 

Any ideas please? When she has one of her "moments" she looks like she's about to keel over and die at any minute

[Beantree]

The only thing I can think of is the toxins given off when worms die Pottage. In severe cases worming them can kill them. Also I wonder if the Flubenzol is reacting somehow with the Ivermectin? They shouldn't mix at all in the system but Ivermectin withdrawal is 28 days with some vets, so there is still some in her. Guess all you can do is wait. Some of ours have done slimy poos after worming started and I suppose that is the result of digested worms.

[Pottage]

So we went to the vets yesterday evening as poor little Lollybot was going downhill and getting worse and worse each day. Yesterday she didn't eat all day and didn't even venture out of the nesting box.

 

So my poor little overworked baby has egg peritonitis, and the vet said she is a very sick girl indeed Her temperature was 42.5 degrees (should be about 39), and she has lost at least 100 grams of weight in the last couple of weeks. She only weighs 1700 grams and the vet struggled to find a fleshy bit to give her her shots.

 

She had antibiotic injections of baytril and something else that possibly began with M. When we got her home she free ranged a bit and ate a little grass and some meal worms, then whilst she was standing there she just laid a yolk in the middle of the lawn. No shell, not even any membrane. My poor, poor little girl.

 

She's going back to the vet tonight for more shots, and antibiotics we can give her at home. If this works and she starts to recover we're going to get her an implant.

 

I thought she was an egg eater as I've been finding sticky mess in their bedroom all week, but it turns out she's just been so over worked she isn't even producing a membrane around her eggs now.

 

Annoyingly, bottom chicken Steve is being vile to her. I think she sees Lola being so terribly ill as an opportunity to work her way up the pecking order. I’ve never seen her be aggressive before, but she was literally jumping on Lola’s back when they were free ranging last night. Poor little Lola doesn’t even have the strength to fight back. I’ve chastised her when I have caught her doing it but goodness knows what’s going on today now I am at work. Fingers crossed they’ll be OK in the run as there isn’t an awful lot of room to be behaving like she was last night.

[Beantree]

So how wrong was my guess then Pottage?!? Poor little girl. Unfortunately the pecking order can change rather dramatically when one is ill. Ours attack the weakest during the moult even. We sometimes have to separate them.

[Pottage]

Yeah, I had looked at egg peritonitis but discounted it because I thought she was still laying but was just eating them. The last time she laid a real egg was Sunday, so fingers crossed we've got her early and she can be fixed.

 

I'm sure people think I am quite mental shelling all this money out on a chicken, given their nominal cost and the fact we are never getting another egg out of her ever again lol. She is my baby though, they all are. I'd throw every penny I had at making her better and giving her a happy little life if I thought it would work!

 

Thank goodness I've got a good job and no children, that's all I can say!

[timebandit]

Please keep us updated about Lollybot. I'll be very interested in how she gets on with an implant. My fingers are crossed for her