Sallygarden Smallholding - The Forum For Sustainable Living

Hi All,
Still learning about keeping chickens and could do with advice if anybody is good enough to reply. We have one hen causing concern. She is one of our first three hens( which we bought at a fair) and as far as I can work out they look like ISA Browns. They are great layers from day one until one stopped laying. She gets bloated intermittently with ruffled up feathers and sits quietly eyes resting. We treated her with baytril once and saw a remarkable improvement but no egg laying since. When she was sick her vent area had sticky feathers, she was losing weight and eating less. She perked up after the antibioitc (and bumwashes) but got unwell again as did one other bird. We segregated the two and treated for coccidiosis as well as homepathic stuff such as honey/garlic/vitamins.
Both responded well one laying throughout, the other fragile hen not laying. They have all been wormed , the coup treated for mites although no evidence of this.They have a great run in the garden and seem very happy up until in the last few days the non layer appears happy but quiet ruffling up her feathers at times.
I wouldn't like to see my non layer on antimicrobials again unless there is definite diagnosis. When she was sick previously there was no evidence of being eggbound.
Any suggestions welcome. She is a lovely hen and I would try again to sort out whats bothering her if it dose not entail frequent drugs.
Dee

I would try a little olive oil in the feed to help if she were eggbound.
Did you check the crop?
I'd also give a few spoons of bioyogurt in the food to help replace the beneficial microbes that are also wiped out by antibiotics.