It is generally a fabulous experience to have backyard hens. It’s fun, they’re cute, they are not a lot of work, and the eggs–! The eggs are so good. But there are some experiences involved that I’d rather not have to go through. And Sam would much rather not go through. Like giving a chicken a bath. In the kitchen sink.

We have 2 white hens (a White Plymouth Rock and a Rock/Leghorn cross), and 3 orange ones (Buff Orpingtons). Of the 3 Orpingtons, only one is distinguishable, and she is the most inquisitive of the three orange ones. The other two, I don’t even remember what the kids decided to name them, because I can’t tell them apart without some concentration.

I think one is named Fancy, or Feathers, and the other is Macique. Like the fancy, “-que” version of Macy. “May-cique.” I dunno, I just let the kids name stuff.

That’s why we had a black Betta fish named Goldie and have a dog named Pants.

But Sweetie, she is different – her comb is longer, and she talks to me when I come out to the coop, and she is always the first to greet me. Hence the name, Sweetie.

When Sweetie started looking not so great–not walking much, not talking much, and not coming down from the coop or nest box for food or water–I inspected her further, concerned that she might have a problem. She also had a lot of mess stuck to her behind. I’ll spare you description of that, except to say that she seemed to be so stuck that walking and eliminating further seemed to be nearly impossible.

So, to Google: “How to bathe a chicken”

Online resources said it’s best to use a sink with a sprayer hose. The only place I have that is in the kitchen sink.

Gross.

So I cleared everything off the counter and brought the bird into the house. Not every day is there a chicken in the kitchen. I mean, one with feathers still on.

The chicken bath went surprisingly better than I anticipated.

She seemed relaxed by the warm water, and relieved by the help. And the baby slept through about half of it.

I blew her feathers dry (yes, with a hair dryer, of course) on the back deck and deposited her back out to the coop, then I cleaned up, rescued the crying baby, and scoured and disinfected my entire kitchen before having lunch.

Several hours later, she didn’t seem to have improved at all.

Back to Google. The all-knowing internet seems to point to one of two things: Egg Bound, or Egg Yolk Peritonitis.

Thanks to The Chicken Chick and BackyardChickens.com forum for the majority of information I got about chickens and chicken ailments.

Egg bound is when a hen makes an egg, and for some reason, it gets stuck on its way out. If they don’t get the egg out within 24-48 hours, death is imminent. The other ailment is an organ malfunction plus infection and usually terminal by the time it’s noticed.

According to the Internet, at-home treatment (which is pretty much the only treatment) for an egg bound hen is as follows:

Water and electrolytes,
Epsom salt bath in warm water,
Dim lights,
Soft music,
Calcium,
Waiting,
More baths,
Massage,
Rest in a dark, quiet corner

It’s like helping a poor chicken in labor. I’m a dang chicken doula!

Okay, here we go again.

Calcium, i.e., Tums, ground with a mortar and pestle, and mixed with scrambled eggs.

I brought the “fruit flavor calcium supplement”-flavored eggs to her in the coop, and watched her pick at the eggs and turn her nose (beak?) up at them.

So, I tried a second bath in warm water. But I skipped the part about dim lights, and bathed her on the back porch. I really just didn’t want to have to go through the same drama in the kitchen.

That evening I was posting on facebook, trying to find the humor in this, and indirectly soliciting the advice of our other chicken-parent friends out there. Our friend, Jim, who knows how to fix everything from computers to appliances to hens, said, “Dim lights, warm bath for 20 minutes, mood music.”

Is the mood music really that important? Okay, then.

The next day I had a meeting in the morning with teachers at the school, and in the afternoon we had violin lessons. Hopefully the chicken won’t die.

But I was secretly thinking, “But if she does die, then I don’t have to put her out of her misery, so…..”

Nope. In the morning she was still here–sad, mopey, straining, and miserable. So bath number 4, along with all the prescribed relaxing tricks.

Maybe she’s not actually egg bound. There’s a way to find out.

It involves surgical gloves and Vaseline.

Oh Lord, why?

We have these animals so that our kids can “experience” taking care of them. Turns out, we as parents are the ones who have all these “experiences.”

After this final bath, and more quality time with Sweetie and the blow dryer, plus another internal exam, we determined that she was not trying to lay an egg that won’t come out; she has some sort of internal infection, and there’s not anything we could do to make her better.

So we said goodbye to Sweetie.

It was difficult, sad, and unfortunate. Like we learned when we had to put down another one of our flock near the beginning, we will do it better next time.

The girls were surprisingly unaffected. They were bummed that she was going to have to die, but we didn’t mince words with them. Then when Sam came back inside, they asked, “Really? Can we see it?!” So I don’t think they’re traumatized.

I guess it was worth it, knowing we did our best to help her, even if it didn’t have a happy ending. Next time we’ll move more quickly.

So even though a doula is someone who helps a birthing mother get through labor and delivery, and I didn’t help this hen produce anything, I can’t help but have that sentiment you get when you are around a brand new baby. “Maybe we should get another one!”