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Over the last few days our chicken is very lethargic and not eating only when fed by hand and then only slightly she is not leaving chicken house and there seems to be no flesh on her breast bone and her abdomen is swollen and her comb is slightly purple in places. She is about 30 months old and is an ex battery hen. She has always seemed to have a good appetite but a bit listless and not as mobile as the other girls. Any advise would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
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personally, in this cold weather i would suggest that she is brought into the warm and hand fed - read the stickie note at the top of the forum on hand feeding "gloop".
however, if her breast bone is really prominent it suggests that she hasnt been feeding for a while.
all ex-batts have a reasonably prominent breast bone - its the breed, however i would check the following:
is the crop full? the bird should go to bed at night with a full crop. the crop should be full and hard, not soft and squishy. if soft then treat as for sour crop
is it showing any interest in food? if not, then she may have gone too far and you should start gloop feeding or similar to get her appetite back
is she showing any signs of mites or lice? if so, treat these too.
apart from that - basic first aid. keep warm, keep her dark and keep us posted as to her progress -
If her abdomen is swollen she may have a tumour. Ex-batts do seem prone to these sadly. I have had 2 with the abdominal swelling - is she "waddling"? When the fluid/swelling gets in the lower part of the abdomen it inhibits their walking. At that stage I had to make the decision to have mine put to sleep by the vet as they were obviously suffering. Your girl may not have reached that point yet but do be careful that she isn't suffering.
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