Chicken keepers beware of the horrors of wet hay. Watch out with your chicken bedding.
Posted by Fiona Nevile in Chickens | 18 comments
“That’s what your little one will look like when she grows up.”
S pointed to a couple of pretty Wyandotte hens in their run.
Last week I didn’t think that Dixie Chick would ever grow up. The month old chick was ill and clearly struggling. Initially I noticed that she was shrieking and pointing her beak at the sky. She was hunched, feathers puffed out and every now and then she closed her small grey eyelids.
As our vets are not really switched on when it comes to avian care, diagnosing Dixie’s symptoms was down to me.
My friend Tessa and I peered at her.
“She looks in pain. I reckon that she’s got something stuck in her throat. We had a goldfish once that was swimming around the pond with its mouth open. We caught it and discovered there was a stone in its mouth.”
Tessa stared at me as I digested the information.
My brother swallowed a safety pin as a child and couldn’t remember whether it was open or closed. The guys in Addenbrooke’s Hospital made him eat bread to contain the pin. If there was enough bread the pin would eventually pass through.
I shot back to the house and found a soft white bread roll. It was guzzled by Mrs Boss and her brood. Insurance just in case we couldn’t catch Dixie.
She perked up with the prospect of bread but all attempts to catch her were hopeless. She stretched for the bounty and then shot away just out of reach. There are intelligent chicks living in this part of England.
So I made another plan. John Coe was coming the next morning to help in the garden. He had kept and handled chickens for years in the past. If I tempted Dixie into the Emerald Castle, lowered the portcullis and dropped a small towel over her we might be able to examine the chick . If John held Dixie, I could open her beak and retrieve anything that was lodged in her throat. I looked out my eyebrow tweezers and a small towel.
John was up for the operation.
“No problem, just tell me when you’re ready.”
When I opened the portcullis, Dixie popped out looking fine. No closed eyes or open beak.
John waited for a good few minutes, watching the chicks peck and spar.
“There’s nothing wrong with her.”
So I drove off to work delighted that all seemed to be well. But when I returned at lunch time she was sitting huddled in the castle grounds looking peaky. If it wasn’t a seed blocking her throat what on earth was wrong? If she was fine in the morning there must be something in the grounds of the Emerald Castle making her ill. I spent the evening on the internet trying to diagnose the problem, digging deeper and deeper into the chicken forums.
It was nearly light when I tottered to bed. Open beaks and beaks pointing to the sky seemed to indicate respiratory problems. I‘d learnt a lot about a vast swathe of chicken illnesses but had no solution. I woke at four and remembered that when the chicks hatched out, Mrs Boss had moved the hay from her nest into the castle grounds. I also recalled a comment from Jo at Little Ffarm Dairy about the spores on wet hay causing respiratory problems in chickens. Suddenly everything fell into place.
I rose at seven and rushed down to the Emerald Castle and cleared the garden completely. I had a brand new sack of gravel which I washed and laid in the run as Mrs Boss and her brood shrieked to be let out. Beaks tapping the portcullis in anticipation of treats. When the job was done I raised the portcullis and the small family shot out looking for corn. I also fed them some scraps of honeycomb as it contains a natural antibiotic. I laced the honey with linseeds to make it more attractive. Once Mrs Boss gave it the thumbs up both chicks tucked in. At lunchtime Dixie looked much better and within a couple of days she was back to her old self again, bullying her diminutive brother and roosting on her favourite spot on top of the boot scraper.
The floor of the Emerald Castle is now covered in a thick layer of newspaper. No dust and so easy to keep spotlessly clean.
During my internet searches I also discovered on the Omlet site that chickens can catch infections from passing wild birds. They recommend Citrocidal as a treatment for respiratory problems. This is an extract of grapefruit seeds that contains a natural antibiotic. Citrocidal is available from health food shops and can be safely added to the water fountain.
I reckon that Dixie was affected by the spores from wet hay. So thank you Jo. It would have been so sad to loose theis precious chick.
My grandmother always advocated the benefits of hay over straw for bedding as mites breed happily in the larger hollow stems of straw. Now it will be newspaper and sawdust every time.
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glad Dixie is okay. we use hemcore for bedding for our banties from a feed place in BSE. seems to stop eggs breaking when laid and they adore jumping in it when it’s freshly laid to remake their beds (evidently we don’t do a suitable job!)
Terrific diagnosis and a wonderful post – thanks! I’m learning a great deal from your experiences already, and I’ve only been reading a day. Looking forward to the day when I have chickens of my own!
Before I moved here, I had dreams of being self-sufficient and keeping goats and chickens.
It’s not that I was so naive on these things. I grew up in the countryside and my mother had 99 chickens. (She originally had 100, but the Egg Marketing Board told her that she must register as a smallholder – so she gave one away.) I used to feed them before going to school(with wellington boots, because the cockerel had one hell of a mighty peck to frighten a 5 year old) and helped my mother collect the eggs.
Now that I’m here, EVERYONE has got, at least, a couple of chickens, so there doesn’t seem much point. Moreover, the more I researched this – and the more I read your site – I now know that I couldn’t deal with the sadness of losing one and I certainly couldn’t kill one. (That’s very hypocritical, because I can roast one.)
All this to say, “I’m so pleased Dixie is alright” (and please forgive my ramble).
When I kept chickens a few of them caught a disease from crows.
What fabulous plumage; my great Grandmother kept Wynadottes, after many years of chicken keeping she decided they were her favourite chickens, so pretty and they liked to be cuddled!
I’m so relieved Dixie has recovered. What a worry!
What a good tip about the honey comb and Citrocidal.
My chicken bible is “Diseases of Free Range Poultry” by Victoria Roberts. She is an experienced poultry keeper and show judge who trained as an avian vet. Like all medical books it’s full of grusome photos and gives you nightmares of panic!!!!! But in the glossary Victoria says:
Hay: never use as litter due to the moulds present.
We bought chopped straw called ‘Medibed’ and still use this in the nests but now use wood shavings under the perches as it’s more absorbant and easier to clean up. With newspaper underneath it’s relatively easy to keep clean.
Celia
PS Dixie is gorgeous – what beautiful patterns!
phew! I’m so glad Dixie is better. Bravo for your detective skills!
Phew – glad to have been of service, it’s great to know that Dixie is better now. I must say that I don’t think it would make a difference (in terms of mites) whether you used hay or straw – the little beggars breed so quickly but tend to live in cracks & crevices of the housing, rather than specifically in any type of bedding. In fact the only place I put straw these days, is in the nestbox, to prevent breakage of eggs as the hens squeeze in & out. The rest of the hens have a sturdy roosting bar under which I put a layer of newspaper & a few woodshavings for their absorbence & antiseptic qualities – although I do dust the house with red mite powder & dry disinfectant powder too.
Ironically I’m sitting here with a streaming cold….so perhaps I should get rid of the duvet & sleep on shavings, instead?!
I’m glad to hear that you were able to figure out what ailed poor Dixie. It’s amazing how much we can find out through the internet now …
Oh it would have been so sad had Dixie Chick succumbed. I’m so relieved to hear that the problem has been solved and she has recovered. She is so pretty. What did we ever do without the internet to find the answers to all our problems (not that it doesn’t also cause problems of its own)? You must feel much more confident in your ability to care for your hens after all the research.