Friday 8 February 2013

We've had two eggs from Matilda and three eggs from Bizzy Lizzy over the last few days!  It's such a treat.  Their combs and wattles are much redder now, so that is definitely a good way to tell who are the layers.  But we didn't know this until we had layers and non-layers to be able to compare them to one another.

Our Orpington hen Didee who is at the bottom of the pecking order is looking a bit poorly.  She still has lots of white poo encrusted onto her feathers and under her perch I found very watery and milky poo.  Today she was fairly listless and dull.  Her head was hunched down into her shoulders and she didn't do a lot.
Didee on the left - hunched in and dull

Didee - All by herself, under the shelter

I don't think it's an impacted crop, because I've been reading about that and one of the symptoms is that they don't eat or drink, and I did see Didee eating and drinking towards the end of the day.  The orange poo I previously had worried about is normal for every tenth poo so maybe they didn't need to be wormed after all.  Another possibility could be egg-bound.  She was the first one to ever lay an egg on our first day of having hens, and she hasn't layed many at all since then, so it is possible.  I shall give her a warm bath tomorrow and see how she goes.  It'll be good to wash off those crusty poos anyway!

I'll do some 'googling' and see what else it could be.  Hopefully we can help her.

1 comment:

  1. Oh no! Sorry to hear Didee is under the weather. A warm bath is a good place to start. Here's a great link for what one blogger calls "the spa treatment" - http://hencam.com/faq/the-spa-treatment/

    I've done this for several of my hens. It may help with Didee, and if nothing else will clean off her bottom :) Keep watching her closely and make sure she is still eating, drinking and pooping.

    ReplyDelete

I love reading your messages. I usually reply via email but if you are a "no reply" commenter then I will happily reply here.

Thanks so much for visiting my blog!