More chicken trouble

Saturday morning was my day to do chicken chores. I noticed with dismay that Sara was waddling, her belly swollen so much that it was displacing her legs. I picked her up. She was heavy, and the skin on her underside was stretched tight. I put on exam gloves. Once again, I couldn’t feel anything hard or sharp. She was not obviously distressed (when I didn’t have a finger in her cloaca). I put her back with the others.

Sara, looking bloated and unhappy

Hilda and I thought that we’d better consider having all the hens butchered. It seemed more humane than watching them die one by one. “Let’s give it until Monday,” I said.

The good news was that Gracie and Nadia have apparently outgrown their pasty butt problems.

I didn’t have much time to do anything more with Sara as Terry and I were taking his truck down to Jane’s mom’s house. Her dad had all manner of tools and workshop stuff that needed to be taken out. Instead of trying to guess what Terry wanted, I thought it would be more expedient to just have him go through it himself. Dave had already set aside what his sons had requested. Once Terry understood that anything he didn’t take was going to Goodwill, he started filling boxes with wild abandon.

Meanwhile, Dave and I loaded the truck with a hutch, two bed frames, two chairs, and a telephone table/chair combo (how quaint), and a couple of boxes and drove to Goodwill. Jane, Dave, Mary, and I discussed the two options. The Goodwill in South Elgin was closest, but was manned by an old guy who was not much help. The Goodwill in Carpentersville hired strong young men, but was farther away. “One guy picked up that table top all by himself,” Jane reported, and that’s saying something. I’d taken the table apart the day before, since I am the youngest and most agile. I lay on my back on the kitchen floor to remove the six screws that attached the top to the legs. It took two of us to roll it to garage and three of us to get it in Jane’s car.

In the interest of time, we went to South Elgin. The guy there was not only old but cranky. He went inside when he saw us pull up not, as I wrongly assumed, to get someone out there to help him, but to get a dolly that was pretty much useless. Dave and I unloaded the whole truck.

Back at the house, we loaded up all the stuff Terry thought he could use and headed home.

I did more research on chicken diseases. As best I could tell, Sara (and also Julia) were not egg bound, but had become “internal layers.” Long story short, they were suffering from a constipated oviduct. The eggs were no longer passing out of their bodies. Yolks, being very nutritious, eventually were invaded by bacteria. The resulting yolk sac peritonitis will kill the bird in 24 to 48 hours. One article I read said that the condition can be treated by spaying the bird. Seriously? Why would you spay a layer? Someone in a discussion forum said the quoted price for this procedure was $1500. Gasp. Plus you would have to know a vet willing to do the surgery. Antibiotics can treat the infection but not the internal laying. I was able to find some helpful drawings of chicken anatomy, from which I learned that the uterus is above the cloaca while the intestine is below. Some folks suggested soaking the chicken in a warm bath for 20 to 30 minutes and/or giving the chicken Tums as a calcium supplement. These two treatments supposedly work for unsticking an egg, which I was less and less convinced was the problem.

But we tried it anyway. Unlike some chicken owners, we were not willing to use the regular bathtub. We got a plastic muck bucket. Hilda filled it with hot water. I put in cold water from the hose until Hilda thought it was the right temperature for a baby bath. (How would I know?) We put Sara in and took turns holding her vent beneath the water. Sara had not read the discussion forum and did not know that she was supposed to feel happy and relaxed. At the end of 20 minutes, Hilda lifted her out, and I wrapped her in an old towel. Hilda sat on the low table we keep the feed on in the coop to hold the chicken in her lap while I fed Sara fragments of two Tums. At least she would have minty fresh breath if she died overnight. I gave her water in between, which she drank without much hesitation.

With the Tums gone, I did another cloacal exam, checking upward for the egg instead of down. Nothing. When I took my finger out, it was followed by a flood of watery poo.

“You’re gonna want to wash that shirt,” I said to Hilda.

“And the pants,” she added.

Watery poo is a symptom of internal laying. It is also a symptom of a hot day, which it was. Because of the hot, windy weather, Sara was perfectly fine being released back into the yard. Her feathers were dry within the hour. Folks who do this chicken bathing thing in the winter have to keep the chicken indoors in a warm place overnight to be sure she doesn’t get chilled.

“What do you think about putting them all down?” Hilda asked. “We haven’t had any eggs in 6 days.”

“I’m not liking this,” I replied, peeling off the gloves. I was spending far too much of my time on chicken butts these days. Any time spent on chicken butts is frankly too much.

This morning, Monday, I noticed one of the chicks was lethargic. Once again, I had no idea what to do. At least it did not appear to involve the back end. I fed the poor thing some watered-down yogurt with an eyedropper, thinking some probiotic bacteria might be helpful.

The Welsummer chick on the right was lethargic

I had to leave for a dentist appointment after that. I went down to Elgin to help Jane move the last of the stuff out of her mom’s basement. I filled up my car with more things I thought Terry would like. We worked steadily from 10:10 to 1:30, when Jane had to get ready for a doctor’s appointment. At that point, everything was out of the house and into the garage. Progress.

When I got home, Hilda reported that Sara was still going out into the run and eating Happy Hen Treats. I can only guess that the infection has not yet set in.

“What about the chick?” I asked.

“Oh, it was dead by 10:00,” she said.

Hilda called the butcher after 4:00. We will take the hens on Saturday for processing on Sunday. If they don’t die first. It is all very sad. And yet, it is also a rite of passage. I am taking one more step in my transformation into a farm wife. I know where my food comes from.