# Heart disease?



## Queenie (May 13, 2013)

About a 18 months ago I bought 5 hens from a local lady. She said they were RIR, but it was very apparent they were a mix of RIR and some game bird. But they were sweet hens and immediately started laying wonderfully. We were thrilled. We would get the occasional shell-less egg or mini-egg. I was curious, but with little experience with chickens, I didn't think much of it. Last May I brought home a full RIR roo and all but one of the girls swooned. MawMaw appeared to be the oldest and top of the pecking order and had little used for the upstart. He naturally insisted on making her his main squeeze. Around June, one of the girls just died. No signs of any foul play, no apparent egg-producing problems, and she had appeared healthy as can be only 2 hours before. Just layed over in the hen house dead. I was perplexed & asked alot of questions in a lot of groups. The conscious was possible heart attack. About a month later, the youngest died. She appeared to have died while laying an egg. Looked like a prolapse. Ok, that would have explained the odd eggs. In August, I was out at the pen and noticed the oldest was acting funny. I brought her in the house and over the course of about a month, I gave her intense 1-on-1 attention. My daughter and I concluded that MawMaw appeared to have had a stroke. She showed all the signs. In time, she was back up and going. To watch a chicken overcome a stroke is amazing. She moved back out and in time shows no lasting effects. 
Today I go out to feed & water everyone and find yet another hen laying in the hen house floor dead. No signs of attack, she appeared fine this morning, and when I examined her, there was no signs of being egg-bound. I know my story is long, but necessary. Do you think these girls just had faulty genetics or could something else be going on? The offspring of these hens have the strong RIR characteristics of the roo, and appear to be healthy. I was hoping to raise chicks this spring to sell, but should I be nervous about selling weak birds? I sure would appreciate your thoughts on this. I'm stumped.


----------



## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

This is where experience will help you in the coming years.

I thought possible heart attack to but with the others there is a common denominator there some where. My first suspicion is the feed. All three of them could have been affected by bad feed. It could be straight out of the bag, something you had too long, stored improperly or picking old feed up from the ground.

Another possibility is a toxin they all had access to. 

What you will find is that if something is wrong in their environment the females are the first to show it. Probably because of the drain that egg laying can be.


----------



## Queenie (May 13, 2013)

I've considered the feed, but it's bought fresh from Tractor Supply every month and stored in a clean never-before-used sealed plastic trash can. Their feed is given fresh every day. Their water is fresh every day as well. The straw in the hen house is fresh & replaced frequently. It may be toxin, but I can't imagine how. We don't free-range due to hawks, so their environment is easy to monitor. They get cracked corn & oats as a supplement and garden & kitchen scraps as treats. Our gardens are organic, so no fertilizers/pesticides used. There is never any food left over at the end of the day ... I have a bunch of greedy gals.


----------



## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

The corn could be a source. Corn easily develops aflatoxins, if I remember right about that being the one. It can also easily mold.

I once had a problem straight from the feed store. They had a pipe rupture and they thought they had removed all of the feed bags that were affected. They didn't and I lost three hens to it. And TSC is told by Purina that feed can last for six months. That is really, really stretching it. They add the minimum requirement of vitamins and minerals. Vitamins begin to lose their efficacy as soon as its bagged. So very shortly after it hits the store shelves its already a lesser quality. Check the tape on the bottom of the bag for the date. I've seen feed as old as five months at TSC.


----------



## Queenie (May 13, 2013)

Where is the best source of feed? Other than TSC, we have one other feed store here locally, and they sell the exact same brands.


----------



## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

Look for volume of sales. I bought my feed from the co-op because their sales volume was so high, they considered a bag of feed two weeks old to be well, old. Ask them. Do they sell a lot of what you're buying, you want to do the best for your birds kind of thing. They'll tell you what they sell the most of.

Dumor and Purina are easy to check since they print actual dates on the bottom of of the bag. See if you have a local mill, they can be tough to find. 

Your local feed store can't be selling Dumor, that's a TSC brand made by Purina so you must be feeding the Purina brand TSC now sells.


----------



## nj2wv (Aug 27, 2013)

Is the date the expiration date or the date is was bagged


----------



## Queenie (May 13, 2013)

Thanks so much Robin. I'll be investigating this.


----------



## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

nj2wv said:


> Is the date the expiration date or the date is was bagged


Date bagged. But that is pretty much the same as made since it is immediately bagged after processing.


----------



## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

Queenie said:


> Thanks so much Robin. I'll be investigating this.


For those of us that pay attention to our birds and have small flocks we can see immediately when something is not right. And because of that we learn very quickly that keeping chickens can actually be quite complicated.

There is a lot of good information on forums like this. They are about the best education tool. But also put your skeptic hat on when you read something that doesn't sound quite right because that type of information does pop up.


----------



## nj2wv (Aug 27, 2013)

Thank you for the information. I am glad I have a good tsc. My feed had a December date.


----------

