Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Poultry and Pets => The Hen House => Topic started by: BillPass on July 31, 2009, 12:05
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Hi,
I own an ISA Brown and she has seemed a bit under the weather for the last few months.
She makes a very chesty sound. This is most obvious when she sneezes (which she does quite a lot) but it can also be heard sometimes when she is just breathing.
In the last month she has also had two incidence of laying two semi-formed eggs at the same time. The night before she lays the double eggs she is completely out of sorts. She is very lethargic (usually just standing in a bush on her own) and will not eat anything but oyster shell. In both cases I have had to put her to bed, since she falls asleep where she is standing.
Apart from the two points mentioned she seems well. Does anybody have any advice?
Thanks,
Bill
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going by all the other advice on here have you checked her for lice and her and the coup for red mite. nickyx
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Hi Nicky,
Thanks you for the reply.
I check her and the coup for lice and red mite regularly. She has neither at the moment, but she did have a case of lice a while back. I treated them with teatree oil. All the feathers on her underside still haven't grown back yet though.
Bill
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well prehaps its them then, she might have had a bad infestation and they have taken it out of her, sorry cannot suggest anything else, im sure the others will post there thoughts. good luck with her and fingers crossed. nickyx
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Just thought maybe a pick me up tonic might brighten her up. nickyx
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I think she sounds rather ill and needs to see a vet :(
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If she's wheezy and sneezing then she sounds (without any other info to go on) as if she's got a respiratory infection and by leaving her in with the others you are risking passing it to them.
Certainly she won't be able to grow her feathers back or put on weight if she's not eating and she won't feel like eating until she feels better - it's a catch 22
I agree with kitkat; she deffo needs to see a vet and if I were you I'd be prepared for them to be able to do nothing and to need to put her to sleep :(
sorry if it sounds harsh but better to lose one and save the flock than pass it on to healthy birds
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When we hadn't had ours long two of our five used to stand about and had a rattly chest. We gave them diluted Citricidal by syringe each evening. It's available from health shops and also online. We were new to chicken keeping and very lucky that they fully recovered and now are happy year and a half old little devils :D
I must say though if they hadn't improved as they did, they would have been off to a vet.
http://www.omlet.co.uk/shop/shop.php?cat=Chicken%20Extras&sub=Health&product_id=207&sort=popularity&start=0 (http://www.omlet.co.uk/shop/shop.php?cat=Chicken%20Extras&sub=Health&product_id=207&sort=popularity&start=0)
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I would isolate her and observe closely, particulary her chestiness and egglaying -are they soft shelled when she does lay? they may be connected. Agree that she needs to see a vet, she probably needs antibiotics to treat a secondary infection.
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if she has been 'chesty' for a few months no wonder she looks misrable.....she probably feels lousey.....take her to a vet and get her sorted x
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Hi,
Thank you all so much for the replies. I have to admit the comments are making me a bit worried.
I had assumed she was not that bad since apart from the sneezing she seems very well. I had also assumed that the semi-formed eggs were due to her trying to make/lay two eggs at once and so not having enough calcium available.
I would be straight to the vet if I new of a good one. However the one vet I have tried in my area was useless and very expensive. They were happy to charge me extortionate rates while informing me they didn't really have a clue.
Does anyone know of a good vet in the Wokingham, Berkshire area?
Does anyone know if there is anything I can buy over-the-counter that would help (and where)? It seems you can't buy antibiotics without getting them of the vet. Is this true?
Thanks,
Bill