Chicken mourning....and excrament

[gailmom.livejournal.com]

Yesterday, when I went out to feed my ladies, I was greeted at the door by 1,2,3,4,5....um...crap.

I fed those girls, then went looking for what I presumed would be signs of a struggle with a predator.

What I found instead was one extremely lethargic Bantam, her eyes swollen shut, barely responsive. Double crap.

We moved her inside to a pet crate with fresh litter, her own water and a handful of food. And there she sat, all day, barely breathing, while I scoured the net to try to figure out what she was suffering from.

Except, without vet testing, trying to diagnose a lethargic chicken is really really difficult. :(

Last night I went to check on her, expecting to have to euthanize her so she wouldn't be suffering...she was more alert, had better color, still lethargic, but much more responsive. I spent some time trying to get her to eat or drink, established she had passed urine but not feces. Shrugged and put her back in....ok, you don't want to eat, but you are clearly better than this morning, let's see what happens lady.

This morning I headed out to the pen. Was greeted by 1,2,3,4...shit! oh, no wait, here comes the 5th. Fed them, then sat around and watched them eat for while. The last to arrive at the gate this morning looks feather picked around her vent. She didn't look like that yesterday and it isn't the remaining Bantam....hm....also, someone in the pen has diarrhea. Fuck.

So I left those ladies and went to check on my sick girl. During the night, she had moved herself to the back of the cage and died, passing feces either just before or just after. I bagged her and moved her to the freezer, then headed to the phone.

Spoke with some people at the Diagnostic Lab at TAMU about what had happened to see if they thought it was worth the cost of a necropsy to see if this is something I should treat for before I lose the other five. The guy told me flat out, the $20 necropsy is only likely to tell us cause of death if it's something like a bound egg, or a yolk inside her....in which case it isn't contagious. He estimated, to do tests for the usual flock concerns where the flock has no new members (which does, he verified to me, narrow down the possibilities) that we are looking at around $80. So we cussed and discussed a bit about possibilities, because I told him "look, it's a chicken...what I'm worried about is if I'm going to lose the rest of my flock...what would you recommend?"

So we are leaving her in the freezer for now. Treating the flock for feather mites (most likely home treatable culprit given the second bird's issues) today. Then if we lose a second, it's time to consider a necropsy.

Damn. My poor ladies. :(