Help needed for hen with red vent

[Ubemansky]

Hi I'm new to this site and had a look to try and find similar problems but didn't find any. I'm worried about one of my hens whose vent is looking very red and sore, and seems to have swelling beneath it. I thought perhaps she was egg bound so I gave her a warm bath and put olive oil on her vent and left her in a cat box in the kitchen. She laid an egg but her vent still looks the same, and still swollen. Her poo seems to be very watery and green. Can anyone advise what might be the problem as all the vets visits in the past with other birds always seem to end with the bird being put down. She's ten months old. Any advice would be much appreciated.

[Davidd]

Hello, well she is not egg bound if she has laid- does she seem lively enough? Is she eating/drinking? does it seem to have any effect on her? What breed is she? When you say her vent is red- is it sore looking? and the swelling underneath her vent- is it bigger than normal? (they will have a large area underneath the vent if in full lay)
If it is something not normal then only a vet can help i am afraid. please let us know how it goes.
regards, David

[Ubemansky]

Hi David, what a lot of relevant questions! I guess I over reacted. She's a Pekin bantam and she actually seems ok in herself - when I stop panicking. She's eating and drinking and hanging out with the others. Her vent does look sore, but I think the real problem is the fact that she seems to have lost most of the feathers from around her vent which rather draws attention to it. Do they usually moult in patches - could this be what's happening? Or maybe she or one of the others is pecking them? Anyway, I guess none of this is life threatening, and I 've calmed down now. I'm just so used to chickens going downhill so fast after first noticing that something's wrong.

Thanks very much for your voice of reason!

[gretl]

Re the watery/green poo - this does not sound too normal... Instead of actually taking her to the vet you could always send a sample of her poo off to be tested to see whether worms/bacteria etc. In the past when mine have had watery/green poo and it has not been worms it has been a bacterial imbalance in the gut, which has always been sorted out by pro-biotics. Vetark do a probiotic for birds called Avipro.

[Ubemansky]

Thanks Gretl. I'll bear that in mind. Sorry for the long delay in replying I stopped checking my post after a couple of days. I only looked today because I'm worried about another chicken.