After Amber struggled with her last egg she only had one day of being back to normal before she looked ill again. I felt really disappointed and am wondering if whatever is wrong with her egg laying is getting worse.
I am so afraid of losing her. She looked ill and wobbly again so once again I hand fed her chopped grapes and sunflower hearts. It was late afternoon so not long until bedtime.
When I went in at dusk Pepper, Dotty and Honey were on the coop roof and Sparkle was on the top of the store cabinet which seems to have become her preferred bedtime position. I peeked in the coop and Amber was in the nest box with Topaz. I think she probably wasn’t strong enough to get on to the coop roof and I was glad she had gone into the nest box. Amber and Topaz seem to have formed a bit of an alliance.
In the morning I put two dishes of mash in the run with some crushed egg shells added. I felt that the mash would be easier for Amber to eat and that keeping her eating helps to keep her strength up.
Some mash to encourage Amber to eat
The two new girls didn’t show any interest in the mash and were preening in the background. They then put their heads under their wings for a snooze and looked like two balls. They are younger (Topaz hasn’t started laying yet) and still snooze a lot more than the other girls.
Sparkle and Topaz
By late afternoon Amber managed to lay her egg and bounced back again. I have noticed that since she has been feeling ill again before laying, her eggs have a vertical stripe around them. It is very faint and is brown but I wonder if it could be blood and could be part of what her problem is. I photographed her last two eggs but it is very faint.
Amber’s last two eggs
You can just see the start of the line at the top of the left hand egg and and again towards the bottom of the right hand egg. It’s a faint broken line. I feel sure this has something to do with her problem.
If anyone has any ideas please leave me a comment. I really want to help Amber but don’t know what else I can do for her. I keep hoping that she will get better but sadly she seems to be getting worse.
In between eggs she is absolutely fine and over winter when she wasn’t laying she was happy and healthy. She also had a few weeks recently where it seemed the problem had gone away for a while. It’s a shame she can’t just stop laying. I am willing her to get past this.
Click here to see the history of my flock.
Sorry to hear Amber is still having a hard time laying.
I was thinking that if you couldn’t find out what was wrong with her and she continues to struggle, it may be worth stopping her from laying as she seemed to be fine in the winter. Apparently you can get a hormone injection to do that, which is what some people do with chickens suffering from peritonitis http://club.omlet.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=23148.
I read a bunch of blogs about chicken keepers experiences with Egg Yolk Peritontis and it seems to hit in various ways, but a common symptom is shell-less eggs from the chicken, which is often mistaken for a softshell, or a normal egg eaten by other chickens as you often only find a yolky mess. I realised this was exactly what you found about 3 posts ago during Amber has a problem again.
I have researched peritonitis and it doesn’t seem to match that. The egg three days ago didn’t have a soft shell in the end. I thought it was going to but when she finally laid it was normal. She shows signs of being unwell two days before laying then the eggs are normal but recently with this faint stripe around them. She has spells of laying okay then seems to relapse back to this again. I will do more research into stopping egg laying. I don’t want rush into anything. thanks for the information. The more information I can gather the better.
The blog post a few days ago didn’t say anything about a soft-shelled egg: you said you found some yolk on the floor and assumed the others had eaten it.
Sorry, I edited it later in the day. I thought what I had found may have been yolk but later went to check on Amber and found her in the nest box where she laid her egg in front of me and it had a normal shell but also with the faint stripe. What I had found earlier may have been some squashed corn. I didn’t know the best way to edit it and had hoped it may not have been read yet.
Oh yeah! I didn’t read down that far when we went back to look at it!
Sorry I can’t help but I do know that a line around can mean shock .. Like if there was a thunderstorm the next day the egg can have a line around it,
But that does not seem to make sense in her case .
That doesn’t make sense because it has been on the last four eggs. I am at a loss with this. Today she is fine again but I dread the next egg.
Even the slightest trace of blood on an egg may indicate the beginnings of a prolapse. One of my new hens has just laid an egg with blood streaks, so I’m going to be watching v carefully. Hopefully it’s just because it’s her first egg …
I know that sometimes the first eggs do have a trace of blood which some of mine did. I will research prolapse. Amber is a year and a half and has had problems laying right from the very start last summer. She then stopped while moulting over winter and started again in spring with the same problems all over again. The faint line has been more recent though and worries me that whatever her problem is, it may be getting worse.