Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Poultry and Pets => The Hen House => Topic started by: Aidy on August 14, 2012, 09:31
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I have noticed that old Daisey appears to be loosing her vision. Over the last week or so she has become a little clumsy and when I threw some corn the other day she didn't see, normally she is greedy and hoovers it all up.
This morning I let her out and she couldn't see the steps down, when she did get down she walked straight into the water bottle, she found her food and took plenty, had a drink then found her back into the coop.
The big question for me now is what do I do :(
Any advice? Knowing what I know about the human eye I suspect there will be nothing a vet could do.
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the only thing I can suggest is that whilst her quality of life is still good then just make sure you place everything in the same place everyday and feed her the mixed corn from your hand. If she continues to struggle to get out of the coop could she not have a ground level little coop just for herself?
Does her eyes show any signs of changing colour - especially her pupils? The reason I ask is to see if she has cataracts or even occular mareks rather than just old age - scroll down on this page (http://www.avianweb.com/mareksdisease.html) to the pictures showing eyes of a normal bird and one with ocular mareks.
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Thanks for that, will have a proper look tonight.
The Iris looks like the normal one in the picture, the pupil also looked big not small from what I can remember this morning.
I dont suspect cataracts, again I am pretty used to this day in day out at work, I suspect it will be retinal, just like us.
Never done ophthlamosocopy on a chicken before :lol:
She is cracking on now, we have had a few years and she was a rescue xbat so maybe just like me old age is catching up.
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I knew you would have already checked for cataracts but really just wanted to check for mareks. I'm sure in your line of work you would have noticed anything like that as it would stand out a mile. So yes guess it must be old age, so just make sure everything is always in the same place :)
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One of the things you will have to be aware of is any startling noise as she will probably panic which won't be good. A rabbit hutch may be the way to go as she will be safe, dry and warm.