A couple of months ago I discovered that my "bossy chook" has been loosing a lot of weight, so much so that her breast bone is able to be felt much more than the other two. After reading and asking questions on a couple of forums it is likely to be worms so I started to examine fresh poops (I know ew, but a birds poop can tell you a lot about what is wrong with them) and sure enough there were little white things that were moving in them - Worms. So they have now been treated with Piparazine from the produce store and finally their poops seem to be worm free. But the bossy one I still dont know about, a lot of the time she is her normal self, scratching and eating everything in sight, then occasionally I will see her with her head sort of drawn in and looking a bit dopey, then she will hear something and be back to normal. Her comb has always flopped to one side but I think lately it has been flopping a bit more and her feathers dont look as nice as the others.
It is funny that I hadnt noticed anything being wrong with her until we were feeding them some gents left over from a fishing trip and the Bossy one was hogging them not letting the other two have any so I grabbed her around the chest to try to hold her back, and that was when I noticed I could feel her breast bone.
From what I have read these are all symptoms of internal parasites, so I am hoping that with time and a bit of TLC she will put on weight and be better. I dont think she has been laying for a while but I have been expecting that with it being the time for moulting, or she might just be getting old in which case she is welcome to live out the rest of her life just being a chook and doing chooky things.
Remember November?
5 years ago
2 comments:
Have you noticed at meal times, if she's getting enough food? Sometimes the stronger hens will block the weaker chooks from the food, until they have had their fill. Leaving not as much for the weaker chooks.
I often watch my chooks are meal times, great way to see how they are all going......
Hi Lucky, Thanks, they have pellets available all the time and when they get kitchen scraps I spread it out in a large garden pot saucer (30cmX30m square) and she makes sure she gets her share, there is always fights over bits of tomato. Thats why I didnt really notice that anything was wrong because she is still eating and being her usual self, just lost weight.
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