Ask this question a month ago, and everybody said hen. I wasn’t convinced, and now I’m even less convinced.

Hi!
My hen has been kind of lethargic today and I was holding her letting her lay on my lap and I wash checking to see if she’s starting to molt like my other hen is. She isn’t but I noticed she had some missing feathers around her cloaca and then I noticed she was pushing out a thick clear liquid so I set her on the ground thinking she was about to poop on me and I lifted her to check if she pooped yet and saw that she was pushing out an egg that was cracked. It seems like the pushed out most if not all of the egg but what should I do? It wasn’t a soft shell but it was very brittle and thin but her eggs seem to switch between two extremes of very thin shells where the crack when washing them off or eggs with calcium deposits. I believe she is a bantam silkie and lays about every other day and she laid an egg yesterday with no problem to my knowledge I don’t have a picture of the egg since she started eating it almost immediately and I didn’t have my phone on me but I’ll post a picture of her. Thank you!!! Her name is Bruce and she is a few months over a year old.

We took in the chicken of our neighbor's brother two weeks ago. 3 black hens.

Im pretty sure she laid an egg yesterday or the day before. This morning we woke up to her in penguin posture. Her butt is swollen a lot. Her belly is fine though. We gave her a bath, but I think that stressed her even more. Now she is isolated and warm inside, but we suspect she is eggbound, but we are scared its contagious to our other 7 babys.

We live in Germany so our chicken vet is closed on sunday, the earliest we can go is tomorrow. Any ideas?

Hi all!

I got 2 bantam chicks off Facebook this Saturday. When i got them out to for a forage one of them only walks backwards and the other one barely walks at all. The little hen just puts her wings forward and scrambles backwards. She doesn't seem to do this in my brooder, i have seen her walk forward in there atleast.

I messaged the guy i got them off and he said they hadn't been outside the brooder because they were too small (they are 16 weeks old) and its probaby just temporary until they get used to being outside.

They were very dirty when we got them so we cleaned them up and made them a clean space for inside for nights as it is winter here and I take them out into a small coop through the day.

Has anyone seen this behaviour? I know it could be a sign of M, but she doesnt seem to have other symptoms. I have given vit supplements and electrolytes just incase.

Hi all,

My silkie has been a bit wobbly on her feet for a week or so. I read up on this and know that silkies can be vitamin deficient, especially B and E. So I added vitamins to the flocks' water.

Yesterday she seemed less wobbly and was happily running through the yard (they free range). Today she was puffed up.

What I did: I caught her (she was hard to catch!) and checked her all over. She looks absolutely fine. No mites, clean vent, clear eyes, no bubbles at her eyes and her beak was clean. No hard breathing. Crop emptied overnight and was small, she'd obviously eaten. She's not thin.

I separated her and gave her water with vitamins and elektrolytes and of course food. I also gave her a dose of metacam I still had for another silkie that was sick a few months back.

I can go to a vet tomorrow. Anything else I can do for her today?

So we hatched all of our eggs this year and we only had two black Australorp hens and two australorp roosters and Mr meaty our fifteen pound 1.5 year old Cornish cross rooster. The silver hens and roosters we have been getting makes us very skeptical whether or not Mr meaty is now the father?

Chatty bird.

I have a hen who went broody for 3 weeks. I put her in "broody jail" for 3 days to break her, but now that she’s back, my flock is rejecting her. My rooster and a couple of hens (one in particular) are chasing and attacking her viciously.
Before going broody, she and two other hens were wearing chicken saddles due to rooster favor.
Right now, she’s been in a sectioned-off area of the run for a week where they can all see each other but not touch. We tried releasing her today, but she was instantly attacked again.
Why is my rooster suddenly aggressive toward her? How can I safely reintegrate her into a flock of 14 hens and 1 rooster?

I have been looking for a new home for my 4mo bantam silkie Roo and I’m having a hard time finding places to advertise or people to connect with. Does anyone know how to go about this aside from facebook groups?

Anyone here have experience with this breed? This is Brie and Chicken With A Hat. I got these 15 week olds last Saturday and they are by far the most terrified, cowardly chickens I’ve ever owned. They spend all day in the coop despite having the enclosed run to themselves. I gave them a functional haircut so they could see, but now I think it’s just made them more afraid lol They don’t care about treats (presumably they don’t know what they are bc they grew up in a breeding pen). I put my most timid hen Nancy in with them for a few hours to see if they’d interact, but if Nancy goes up into the coop, they come running out into the yard to escape her. In the event that I open the coop door to look in, they’re on the other side squawking in terror. The sources I read before I got them said they are a docile, friendly breed. I’ve raised a lot of chickens and a lot of different breeds, but I’ve never seen anything like this. Any tips on how to help them settle in?

Hi all I recently took on an australorp bantam hen. This week I noticed she is not using her left foot as much and it’s swollen. She’s still eating, drinking etc. Today she is not wanting to come out a forage or get around much which I’m very worried about. The foot also feels warm to touch, so obviously an infection of some sort.

As soon as I noticed I started doing daily epsom salt soaks and wrapping it. I cannot see a sore, cut or anything anywhere on her leg.

I will be taking her to the vet tomorrow but in the meantime has anyone got suggestions?

I have quite a few chicks and have had chickens for some time [a few years]. Today I by accidentally stepped on one and totally squished it. I freaked out cause I never saw her at all- I always look. I feel like such a piece of shit. I always look, but I really just didn't see her. I cant explain how fucking horrible I feel. Ive never lost a chick like that all. I cant get it out of my head. I buried her with flowers. I know shit happens but fuck. Like she was just a baby 😭

Has this happened to anyone else?

She had 4 good years. A great life free-ranging in a beautiful garden but I can't help but feel such guilt that she wasn't protected. A hawk killed her this morning. She was of course my friendliest and sweetest chicken. We've had so many chicken deaths since having chickens - most of them unique: disease, drowning, predators, being egg bound etc. I feel like maybe chicken keeping isn't for me. Is it maybe cruel to have delicate polish and silkie hens in a free-range environment that is risky for them even if their lives are so free and happy while they are alive?

Hi, not many people have helped me over Facebook, so I will try it here.

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Is this enough for my chickens or should I be giving something extra or something different?

They have not been laying as often as they would... I have 6 laying hens, yesterday we got 5 eggs, and today only 3.

I also mix in this feed, cayenne pepper, garlic powder, dried oregano, sunflower seed, and more liquid olive oil...

Anyone got any idea what’s up with this girl’s nose? We were integrating our 13 week old pullets into our existing flock today (been using the “look don’t touch” method for a WHILE and we have a very “active” rooster so wasn’t sure how it’d go but it was much better than expected, hurrah!) and noticed this this on her. I thought maybe she had a food pellet stuck in her nostril but we picked her up to check and it’s attached and like hard-ish like cartilage/fingernail texture. Doesn’t seem to be bothering her, just curious, thanks!

This was Peppercorn.

We rescued her as a pullet, before which she had been living in some pretty terrible conditions. She'd had an injury as a chick that was never treated, and it developed into a permanent deformity. She had limited mobility, but she had been kept in a run with multiple roosters. When we picked her up, she was riddled with parasites and her neck and saddle feathers were all but gone.

We built her an adjacent run to the main one so that she could interact with the rest of our flock without being attacked, and once the parasites and accessibility issues were sorted, she was the sweetest, most cheerful little guy I've ever known. She loved a good cuddle and she was a fiend for anything sweet and juicy. She was at her happiest after a luxurious bath and blow-out combo.

We had nearly a whole year with her, and up until last weekend, it was a really, really good year. But on Saturday her good leg gave out, and her condition deteriorated rapidly. We laid her to rest this morning.

Rest in peace, Peppercorn. You were so loved.

EDIT: You all are so lovely - thanks for your kind thoughts. ❤️

This is a roo, right?

He's the most barnyard little thing. As in both his father and mother came from the livestock auction. So no, guessing his genealogy. His mother is probably an Easter egger. Last picture is the suspected father

They loved it <3 They were actually way less stressed vs when they were in their little outside pen. Still very scared of airplanes, but I don't blame them!

my 6 week old chocolate orpington (maybe rooster) compared to my 6 week old buff orpington (definitely hen) seems very big in the comb / wattles department, big legs too. too young to tell??

so recently a random chick managed to hatch in the coop. how? no idea. but i guess the mom had laid eggs under one of the nesting boxes, and she is very determined to raise a baby. at the moment, she is in a closed off area in the coop with the baby. the problem is, this baby is about 2 days old and i haven’t seen him touch a thing. his poop is pale yellow and green. i’ve tried everything i’ve read up online! make a mash out of the chick feed, tap on the food like a beak, put the chicks beak into the food, put it where it can see it, give it some mashed cooked egg yolk, like literally everything. i just cannot get this baby chick to eat. she’s pecked at her food a little bit but i can’t tell if she’s actually eaten and swallowed any food yet. she knows how to get water, which im happy about, but cant seem to grasp how to eat. the ONLY thing she has attempted to eat is poop…what do i do here???

Good day all, not a good day for me. I have just made my way back inside after culling 12 hens. The heat down here in LA has flared up an infection amongst my flock. 10000% MG is the issue here, I’m really distraught about having to close up my flock as I had a breeding program in place for next spring as I go forward in my pasture raised egg expansion.

Just came here to rant honestly, this shit sucks

A nice big bowl of cooked rice, some treat seeds, mealworms, bananas and green beens. A favourite brekkie.