Chicken Health, Common Diseases And Cures
Chicken Health and cheap remedies.
In this day and age there are dozens and dozens of chicken health problems that vets would prescribe a variety of antibiotics and medicated chicken rations for. Sometimes these can be quick and cheap remedies, and sometimes they can be slightly costly. In this article I’ll be talking a little about age old remedies that they used before all these fancy antibiotics came out. These remedies are cheap, simple, and use easily available ingredients.
Chicken Health and Prevention
I’ll go over some of the most common types of chicken diseases and unconventional cures, but lets start off with the best cure… prevention. Making sure that your chickens are kept DRY and warm are some of the best preventative cures against mites, bugs, bacteria, and a load of other diseases. Giving them a good sized run so that they get lots of exercise and giving them a nutritious diet will stop the majority of their other respiratory or infectious problems.
If you leave hens with plenty of roaming space they’ll take care of their dietary needs by themselves, doing chicken things to weed down the bug and worm population. This isn’t always an option because of predators in your area, or because you might be raising your chickens in an urban setting. You’ll also have to protect your garden from them if you go this route.
So lets say you have a limited space for your chickens, and are looking for easy ways to make sure they stay healthy and happy. (A happy hen will have higher egg production)
Feeding Onions and garlic to your chickens will prevent worms from setting up house in their innards. For diarrhea, a small dose of sour milk mixed in with their water or feed will work.
Chickens stepping or pooping in their feeders and water are a big source of infection also, so make sure that you set up your feeders and watering equipment with measures that wont allow any droppings or feet in them.
During the winter it’s harder to keep your hens exercised and warm, but it’s still possible. Simply scatter scratch feed around your chicken house litter every day. This will keep the litter dry and exposed to lots of air, increasing sanitation. It will also force your hens to exercise. On a morning that is especially cold you can add one tablespoon of kerosene to the drinking water, it will safely give them a pick me up without any negative effects.
The Most Common Chicken Health Problem
The most common disease that you’ll have to deal with among your chickens is likely going to be diarrhea. This can be identified by green or white droppings. This happens from unwanted moisture inside the chicken coop, general dirtiness and food that’s not clean. If a hen has diarrhea you can isolate them somewhere dry and warm. Giver her some potassium permanganate solution for drinking. You can make this yourself, just dissolve a tablespoon of the chemical into a quart of hot water. If all your chickens suffer from diarrhea and it’s pretty bad, throw enough of the chemical into their drinking water so that a dipped finger will turn slightly brown.
Keep in mind if you are using a metal water container you won’t want to use potassium permanganate, it doesn’t keep well in metal. Use an alternate water container until their diarrhea has ceased.
Since there are so many health problems that you can encounter, it’s often hard diagnose what they have, or how to treat them accordingly. Sometimes people don’t even know if their chickens are unhealthy, because they don’t know what to look for.
There are several things to keep I mind when assessing your chickens health, the first being they Eyes. If your chicken has bright, alert eyes chances are it’s healthy. If they are hazy or there is a foggy film over the eyes, somethings wrong.
If they are not making a lot of noise, then something is wrong also. Hens are happy when their noisy and cackling like crazy.
If they struggle and fight back when they are caught, that’s a good sign. If a chicken doesn’t have the will or power to struggle with you at least a little bit, it could mean it’s well tamed, but chances are it means its very weak for some reason.
Check the color or your hens skin. A chicken should have a yellowish skin color. Keeping In mind that different breeds have their own slight color differences, in general it should be light yellowish. You can simply push the feathers apart and check the chickens skin. If it is bone white or grey you have serious problems.
If the chickens tongue is a different color other than light pink, you’ll also have to take it to the vet or do more research depending on the color to assess what is wrong with it. It’s hard to to and you’ll probably get pecked a lot, but it you can look inside the birds beak to check on the tongue, it will tell you a lot about your chicken health.
If your chickens feet are swollen they most likely have mites or some other vermin or pest that are giving them problems. Make sure the feet are thin and well shaped.
The poop is generally the biggest indicator to their health, it should be thick, black and white. If it’s watery or different color other than black and white you’ll know somethings wrong.
If your chickens feathers are falling off, it’s not usually a disease, it’s caused by unruly pecking from other hens, a form of cannibalism.
Cannibalism can be caused by many factors, including crowding, small feeder and water space, and malnutrition. Even feeding pellets instead of mash can increase the odds of cannibalism. Try to not keep the chickens on wire floors instead of litter… this will agitate them and make them angry, increasing the odds of cannibalism also.
Letting the birds have access to a large range causes cannibalism to stop immediately, but not everyone has a large field they can let the chickens run in. If you just have a run and coop, and cannibalism is an issue in your flock, there is another cure. In the morning, add one tablespoon of salt per gallon to their drinking water. Later in the afternoon replace the salt water with regular fresh water. Repeat every 3 days until they stop pecking at each other. This is supposed to be 99% effective, and was developed by the Wisconsin experiment station way back in 1942. I haven’t had many problems with cannibalism but in the few instances I have, this cure has worked every time.
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