You ever have a hen who has a beak that seems to delaminate and soften? This is a first for me.
She’s in good spirits, doesn’t seem to be in pain, and forages a lot. But, she can’t seem to grab much food in her beak - especially no grass.
She can get some layer crumbles and mealworms but not as much or as easily as in the past. I’ve been weighing her the past four days and she’s hasn’t lost a noticeable amount of weight. But, yesterday I also started supplementing her with moistened layer crumbles (offered separately from the others) and she devours it. It seems to only be the upper beak, the tip of which appears to have broken off yesterday afternoon.
Today I got a vitamin mix (couldn’t hurt?) named “Nutri-Drench” and added that on top of the moistened crumbles.
Just curious since I’ve never seen this before.
Like you said yourself, beaks regrow, they’re like nails.
Vitamins probably couldn’t hurt, but for this to be a nutritional deficiency you should either see the same issue in more birds, or have a good explanation for why you don’t.
To me it seems much more likely that the chicken pecked at a rock and chipped the beak.
Paying close attention to the bird could never hurt, making sure it gets feed and water etc. But it shouldn’t be a problem, I’ve seen something a bit worse before and the chicken was fine.
Thanks bud!
I’m 96% positive that the end of the beak wasn’t chipped/broken when I started noticing the layer separation, but I could always be mistaken. I just weighed her again (probably going to post that as a new thread because it tickles me) and she’s gained a bit of weight since I started checking weight so… I’m sure she’s fine.