My Hen is Egg Bound! Now What?

I just typed this out for the billionth time on a forum, so I thought I’d post it here. The bird in question was a canary, but egg bound canaries and finches can be treated exactly the same way. Here you go.

You’ve just found an egg bound hen. In other words, you found her sitting on the cage floor, maybe with her wings spread, or some other position that makes you know something is wrong. Let’s go ahead and assume it’s an egg. You might see the shape of one on her belly but you may not see it. Probe gently and maybe you can feel it. (I can’t feel them; other people can)

You need to work as fast as possible. Canaries and finches don’t live long remaining egg bound. Bigger birds can, but canaries and finches can die in a few hours.

Note: Vet is always best.

But here’s what to do if it’s late or Sunday or something.

Put her into a small cage (hospital cage, you do have one right? Everyone needs to have one). She needs 2 things: heat and humidity ASAP. Sometimes I take the hospital cage into the smallest bathroom and run hot water in the shower until it’s nice and steamy, leaving her in there at least an hour.

Let her have food and water as normal, except put some electrolytes into the water. I like to use Guardian Angel, (not affiliate link) it has vitamins to help them. You can also use Thrive, below. (affiliate link)

 

You can beak dose calcium. If you don’t have powdered that is made to mix into the water, go to Tractor Supply and get the calcium gluconate for cows. It will look like this:

You have to draw it up with a needle/syringe. Be sure to dilute it in water., so you draw it up with a needle, squirt into a tiny bowl of water, then draw that up into a different syringe (one without a needle) or a pipette.

She probably won’t open her beak for you but if you dribble a TINY bit on the side slowly, you will see her swallowing it down. Dose her every hour. Slowly, slowly. You don’t want her to aspirate.

There are many who will tell you to expel the egg. DO NOT DO THIS. It will kill your hen, it is painful for her and completely unnecessary.

And maybe stupid.

Because if it breaks inside her, you’ve just killed your hen.

A few products for good health are listed below. They won’t fix and egg bound hen, but utlizing them might help avoid the problem next time.

Products may contain affiliate links; by purchasing them, I may receive compensation which goes to a non-profit parrot rescue organization. Thanks for your help.