My chicken is in the process of recovering from heat exhaustion and now has some weird behavioral patterns. Help?!

[heckitypeck]

We had a pretty big heat wave where I live, temperatures well over 110, and my chicken yard was unprepared. My chickens had access to water and shade but just about nothing else to beat the heat (they have a mister, a pool, and a fan now lol). Anyway, one of my chickens was found lying on the ground one morning and so she was taken inside. After sitting in the air conditioning and getting force fed some water she was doing better, and I ended floating her in a little bucket of water and she floated and drank water and was doing better. Since extra supplies were put out in the chicken yard she was put back out there, and she's a little lethargic and lays on the ground most of the time but she will move away if you try to pick her up now, which she wasn't doing before.
What concerned me is that, while putting everyone away in the coop for the night, she did this thing where she pecked at a spot in the coop like she was a woodpecker pecking a tree for absolutely no reason. There was nothing there to peck at, no grains, no treats, not even any hay or wood shavings where she was pecking. Just the wood the coop was built out of. My mom said she pecked like that this morning as well. Should I be concerned? I'm a bit worried her getting that level of dehydrated and overheated may have caused some sort of brain damage.... If anyone knows why she might be doing stuff like this please let me know.

 

[Eggcessive]

You may want to give her a poultry vitamin and electrolyte supplement, such as Poultry NutriDrench or Poultry Cell 1 ml per every 3 pounds of weight orally for several days. Those have vitamin E and others as well which can help to treat neurological symptoms. Some cooked egg and moist chicken feed may also help.

 

[gtaus]

Welcome to the BYC forums. What a sad story about your chicken and the heat. I live in northern Minnesota and have yet to have a chicken suffer from being too hot. Recommend you add your location to your BYC icon so people can have a good idea of the type of climate you are dealing with.

FWIW, I'd suggest putting that chicken in a chicken hospital for at least a few days of recovery, and it would not hurt to supplement the water with electrolytes and vitamins. I usually feed my sick chickens some scrambled eggs. Seems to help. At least, if you have the chicken isolate from the other, you can better monitor what she eats and drinks. I have a portable dog crate/kennel that I use to isolate and treat my sick chickens.

Hope your chicken recovers.