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Hello
I wonder if anyone can help? I have three ex-batts who arrived at the beginning of June. They have all flourished, have put on weight and started getting their feathers back and have been healthy and happy so far, apart from the occasional soft egg. They have been laying fairly regularly; sometimes I don't get an egg every day from all of them but mostly over the last three or four weeks there have been three eggs in the nest box every day. I keep them in a 6ftx6ft pen and try to let them out for at least 45 mins to an hour every evening so they can have a scratch around in the soil. The floor of the pen is covered in easibed wood shavings and I poo pick every day; I also clean the poo out of their house every morning. So they are kept very clean. They have fresh food and water every day, layers mash with about a third of a teaspoon of poultry spice in it, corn in the evenings and a cabbage thrown into the pen for them to attack about three times a week.
Yesterday when I went to collect the eggs I found a blood streaked soft-shelled egg which I threw in the compost bin. Today I let the girls out at 7.15am and found another egg with blood streaks on it, this time with a proper hard shell. There was the usual amount of poo in the house and just a little of it had blood in it, but the egg had landed in this poo so I wasn't sure if the poo had blood IN it or ON it, if you see what I mean. However one of the girls had done a bit of poop in the pen and there seemed to be a bit of blood in that. I have examined the vents and they are all clean. All the girls are stuffing their faces and scratching around and don't seem poorly in themselves.
Does anyone have any idea what this could be? The egg I found this morning had quite a lot of blood streaks on it. I think it is Mavis, and as far as I know she has not laid a soft-shelled egg before yesterday (it's usually Deidre who has funny laying habits but she went in the nest box after Mavis yesterday and laid a normal egg. Rita's eggs are always huge and speckly so I know it wasn't hers). Could this be a bit like piles in humans, ie Mavis strained to lay a soft-shelled egg yesterday and still has a burst vein or something inside her vent? Or is it something more sinister?
Should I wait until tomorrow and see how she is and if she lays another blood-streaked egg then take her to the vet? I have a good avian vet (he is an avian specialist). I have to go out to work now but I will check on the poo situation when I get back - although I think the easibed may have soaked up any evidence as it's very efficient at drying out poops!
Could it be coccidiosis? Wouldn't this have been obvious before now though, as I've had them for nearly four months?
I hope one of you experienced chooky keepers can advise me. I want to do the best for my girls but I only have four months' experience of healthy chickens, not poorly ones!
Thanks for reading this.
I wonder if anyone can help? I have three ex-batts who arrived at the beginning of June. They have all flourished, have put on weight and started getting their feathers back and have been healthy and happy so far, apart from the occasional soft egg. They have been laying fairly regularly; sometimes I don't get an egg every day from all of them but mostly over the last three or four weeks there have been three eggs in the nest box every day. I keep them in a 6ftx6ft pen and try to let them out for at least 45 mins to an hour every evening so they can have a scratch around in the soil. The floor of the pen is covered in easibed wood shavings and I poo pick every day; I also clean the poo out of their house every morning. So they are kept very clean. They have fresh food and water every day, layers mash with about a third of a teaspoon of poultry spice in it, corn in the evenings and a cabbage thrown into the pen for them to attack about three times a week.
Yesterday when I went to collect the eggs I found a blood streaked soft-shelled egg which I threw in the compost bin. Today I let the girls out at 7.15am and found another egg with blood streaks on it, this time with a proper hard shell. There was the usual amount of poo in the house and just a little of it had blood in it, but the egg had landed in this poo so I wasn't sure if the poo had blood IN it or ON it, if you see what I mean. However one of the girls had done a bit of poop in the pen and there seemed to be a bit of blood in that. I have examined the vents and they are all clean. All the girls are stuffing their faces and scratching around and don't seem poorly in themselves.
Does anyone have any idea what this could be? The egg I found this morning had quite a lot of blood streaks on it. I think it is Mavis, and as far as I know she has not laid a soft-shelled egg before yesterday (it's usually Deidre who has funny laying habits but she went in the nest box after Mavis yesterday and laid a normal egg. Rita's eggs are always huge and speckly so I know it wasn't hers). Could this be a bit like piles in humans, ie Mavis strained to lay a soft-shelled egg yesterday and still has a burst vein or something inside her vent? Or is it something more sinister?
Should I wait until tomorrow and see how she is and if she lays another blood-streaked egg then take her to the vet? I have a good avian vet (he is an avian specialist). I have to go out to work now but I will check on the poo situation when I get back - although I think the easibed may have soaked up any evidence as it's very efficient at drying out poops!
Could it be coccidiosis? Wouldn't this have been obvious before now though, as I've had them for nearly four months?
I hope one of you experienced chooky keepers can advise me. I want to do the best for my girls but I only have four months' experience of healthy chickens, not poorly ones!
Thanks for reading this.
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