Chickens dying

[Lynda Gould]

We lost our Americana hen last night. We thought she got locked out of the coop last night & froze. Poor girl. It was about -20 with the windchill. Tonight my son found a Silver Wyandotte dead. She wasn't frozen yet. Now we're thinking the first one died & he just didnt see her when he locked everyone else in last night. He checked their feed & found a mouse living in the feeder tonight. Could this be the cause of their deaths? I don't know what is going on & don't want to loose the other 9. We got them Easter of this year, so they are young. They only laid for about a month or so before cold weather hit & they stopped laying. We haven't had any eggs at all but I thought that was normal during winter. Any ideas?

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

Unfortunately it can be hard to guess why they died without a necropsy. Two could just be a coincidence, if more were to die I might start to worry.

Chickens generally don't die solely from the cold if they have proper housing.

Mice can be a nuisance, but generally they shouldn't be deadly to chickens.

What do you feed your chickens? Too fatty of a diet can cause sudden deaths.

 

[sourland]

Welcome to BYC - sorry for the circumstances. Are you certain that they have an adequate supply of water ? Water deprivation is not uncommon in these excessively cold temperatures.

 

[Lynda Gould]

They get plenty of water & they get their feed & veggie scraps. I did just give them some spinach yesterday morning. Could that make them sick? I've given it to them before with no problems.

 

[sourland]

Spinach should not have caused any problems.

 

[WildCHILD400]

Scraps should be fine as long as no raw rice, beans, potato or avocado was in there. Mice are big disease carriers so get rid of that batch of food and change the bedding maybe the hens got some mouse droppings instead of food? Sorry to hear this and I wish you luck

 

[Lolacan]

I think if you lose another you should send a bird body for a necropsy. I think it's important to the rest of your chickens.

 

[Welshies]

Agree with the above posters. I have only had one chicken die of cold. That was an 8 week old chick in -40°F (-40°C) weather, and it was huddled by itself under a nest box, away from the heat lamp. Found it dead there frozen stiff.

 

[Alaskan]

I would suggest you give the rest of the flock a good look.

Make sure none are thin, check for external parasites, make sure their crops are full at night when they go to bed.

If you are far enough north that the days are still short, they might need a light so that they have enough hours in the day to eat and drink.

Make sure that during daylight that they ALWAYS have feed and water.


And no, I can't imagine the mouse would have made them sick.

 

[Lynda Gould]

So today as we were looking at them, we noticed several of them seem to have pale looking tips on their combs. Are they sick? Does this indicate worms or parasites?