Poorly chicken

[Paulfi]

Help! I've noticed some black spots on one of my hen's combs. The other bird is unaffected.

Is it fowl pox? Has she caught her comb on something and it's a scab? Is it something else?

[Luvachicken]

They do look like scabs to me, hopefully someone else will come along and agree.

I expect one of the others gave her a couple of pecks.

I would imagine if it were something else she would be looking poorly and hunched.

Is she eating and drinking ok ?

Keep a close eye on her just in case.

[Paulfi]

She seems to be, I've seen her do both and she was happily pecking away at corn etc. Fingers crossed it's nothing too much to worry about then, I haven't seen pecking between them (we only have 2 chickens) lately but they do have a ... Chequered history!

[Luvachicken]

Most likely a mean, little peck then.

I had one who liked the neck feathers of the others, never ever saw her do it though, but they all had neck feathers missing apart from her.

[mullethunter]

Looks like scabs to me too

[Beantree]

Just scabs from minor injury which should drop off in a few days.

Fowl pox is very different. The scabs are very big, with raw flesh areas and don't go away. We had what we thought was a case once and couldn't treat it with what we had: nothing worked and we were trying for 6 months. But the strange thing was the Orpington cockerel was with three squabbling Wyandottes and three Orpingtons. When we removed the Wyandottes the area on his comb healed up in a week and the scab just fell off, so clearly the condition was stress related.

[Paulfi]

Thank you so much everyone. This is really reassuring.