OLD AGE and what to expect

[City Farmer Jim]

Without sounding to morbid what happens to an "older chicken" when they reach end days. Here's why I ask...we just lost a hen that is 7 ish she. We live in south Texas and she has seen a lot, from a 7 day stretch of no power and below freezing, to nearly the same the following year(both times in February) to 98 plus temperature for 6 months to the loss of flock mates of 1 to 2 a year until she died today for no reason I can find...we have had 2 girls with "sour crop" and 1 that was "egg bound" die from her original flock so I know what to look for in that area...she started to move slower than normal on Saturday but I didn't think much about it but each day was a little slower. She missed the "automatic door" Monday. We have a pesky "posom" that tried to get a free meal of her but we stopped it and she only lost a few tail feathers and no blood was shed an she continued down hill from there...she would eat and drink(not a lot) and was moving from place to place throughout the day until this afternoon when I found her slumped over and had died. Is what she did a natural death process for chickens? I at a loss to figure out why....HOWEVER the only thing that was different is the color of her comb it was almost a Maroon color and not the normal red she always had. She was a silver laced Wyandotte. Thank you for any insight you can offer. The rest of the 7 birds are normal as usual and no issues with them...

 

[21hens-incharge]

First I am sorry for your loss. It's never easy when our old ladies pass away.

From my experience the dark comb color often indicates a circulation or heart issue.

 

[City Farmer Jim]

Then there was or is nothing we could have done to prevent it? The coop dynamic has already shifted. I lovingly called her the "inforcer" because she kept all the rest of the flock in line for the head hen. The new "inforcer" is asserting her dominance in no uncertain terms..