AUSTRALIAN POULTRY FORUM™

Its hard to tell really, she's at the age when she might be thinking of laying but she does sound sick.

Couple of questions:

Has she been wormed?
Have you checked her for external parasites (and your other birds). You say they are picking insects off her, could it be mites?
One way to test this is run your hand (wearing a glove) under the perch at night, if there's blood on your hand...you have mites.
If she has a bad infestation though you'll either see them with the naked eye or when you part her feathers. If it is mites and you don't treat it, it can lead to death. They will spread through the whole flock and will probably require a complete clean out of their housing, nesting etc to kill the cycle of the mites. Here's a good article on controlling mites in poultry: http://www.backyardpoultrymag.com/issue ... _John.html

If it is a respiratory disease she would be best removed from the others to give her a chance to recover and not pass any possible sickness on to them. She needs to be kept someone warm, dry and as stress free as you can. Her food and water need to be good and you could even offer her the rickets diet as a pickmeup while her immune system gets back on track. She can hopefully fight it off herself. If she continues to get worse antibiotics may be required which is a trip to the vet.

There's probably other things I've missed, hopefully someone else adds something. Good luck with her

I'm sure it doesn't matter what your chook in in, as long as she has room for a bit of movement... I'm sure anything would work. You want to make sure she's out of the wind and somewhere she can be kept warm while she recuperates. Maybe the laundry so you can make sure she's not tipping over food and water etc? The good thing about keeping them separated is you can keep an eye on their poo too. If you spot blood in her poo then I suggest treating her for cocci to be on the safe side.

You can use reptile heat pads under the bedding (as long as its kept dry) as a way to help provide warmth, or you might just choose to keep towels over/around the cage.

Generally a chook will recover from a respiratory illness if she was nice and healthy beforehand. Do keep in mind though when their immune system is down is does sometimes make them susceptible to secondary illnesses which might require antibiotics. The rickets diet is like a probiotic for her so its well worth making and giving.

It really doesn't sound normal leading up to egg laying, but I can't see her so really can't be sure. It would be very bad luck to have her be egg bound on her first egg! I think you should trust your instincts that something isn't quite right and assume she's not feeling well. In the morning if she looks like she hasn't handled a cold night very well I'd be separating her then.

I would suggest while she's separated make sure she has pellets and clean water and I wouldn't feed scraps while she's feeling off. Offer her the rickets diet as a supplement and maybe you could try vitamins in her water. In the end this is all just my opinion of course, it doesn't make it right It very hard when you can't see the chook or know what their living conditions are like. I wish you luck getting her better.

My pleasure I've got Storey's guide to raising ducks...they're great books aren't they.