Special Needs Chickens

About a month ago, we discovered that one of our chickens could no longer move one of her legs. We brought her into our office to isolate her and see if her health improved -- she seemed generally healthy, except for her leg. She lived like a queen in a large dog crate for about a week, supplementing her regular diet with fresh greens that by luck had been started as a seed viability test. We changed her newspaper bedding many times a day. Her digestive system certainly worked. This was not a sustainable solution for our farm chicken ....

In a small backyard chicken setting, a chicken with only one functional leg might be manageable. In a modest-sized farm chicken operation like the Learning Farm's, this chicken required special care that we did not have the capacity to provide. She was not able to compete with the other hens to access food and water, and would not survive in the flock. We were not able to continue nursing her inside for the long term, and her leg was not improving.

The hens' future looked uncertain, but bleak. Culling birds who are injured, diseased, or past their egg production years is an unfortunate production-flock management reality. None of us were eager to end this hen's life, but we knew we were unable to care for her.

I dug through my email box and located a woman who adopted a few hens from our last flock. I emailed her, changed the newspaper in the crate again, waited, and hoped for a new home for this chicken.

Success! Within short order (but a few more newspaper changes) this person connected me with a woman who not only wanted to adopt this chicken, but actually had a home for her in a special needs flock. The perfect scenario! Kerri is a vet tech and "chicken eggspert" who has chickens of her own, in addition to helping other poultry hobbyists (www.thechickeneggspert.com). Kerri dubbed the chicken "Rhoda" (she is a Rhode Island Red), and took her home to join a one-eyed rooster, a one-legged hen, and a few new friends. Whew!

I recently heard from Kerri that she x-rayed Rhoda's hip and found that it was dislocated. While Rhoda was under anesthesia, she put the hip back into place, but the surrounding tendons and ligaments were unable to adequately support the joint. Although her hip pops in and out depending on how she moves, it doesn't seem to be painful. Kerri continues to provide excellent care to Rhoda and hopes that with continued cage rest, eventually her ligaments will tighten up and provide more stability to her leg.

Rhoda's future plans include making new friends, munching on grass, and discovering bugs. We're happy she has found a new home, and thankful for people like Kerri who work hard to care for special chickens, and support the growing backyard chicken phenomena!