Update on Sunny

A picture of her today after she just got done eating watermelon :)

 I was trying to figure out what day all this started, but I think it's been about a week!  We are lucky that Sunny has been doing so well!  She's still eating great, drinking great, and we let her outside to run the yard with her sisters once we rewrap her wing each morning.  The area of the wing the bone has come though isn't exactly getting better.  Actually it may be a little worse because we can now see two bones.  A family friend that's a retired vet said the area needed to be covered by skin for her to recover.  The problem is there isn't much skin around the area left.  BUT there is a little skin starting to grow between the bones.  I don't think the wing is broken like I originally did (she still flaps it really well - I know because I get flapped daily), but with such a big open injury, she's very susceptible to infection.

I spent many nap times looking up chicken information.   I've repeatedly told Kevin that if she was suffering, we wouldn't prolong the inevitable, but she's not suffering.  She's keeping up with her sisters, and acting perfectly healthy.   This week I joined a chicken forum to see if this had happened to anyone else and how they handled it.  I only found one instance and she had opted to have the wing amputated.  Their quality of life doesn't really change much without a wing.  Her breed can't fly anyways, so losing one wing wouldn't really change much.  But, I had no idea what that would cost.  And being practical, she's a $2 chicken and Kevin and I both agreed we couldn't fork out hundreds of dollars for surgery.  I went ahead and called two places to see if they could give me an estimate.  (BTW, it's really hard to find a clinic that will accept chickens as patients.)  The first place, in Evansville, said they had never done a wing amputation but they were estimating for a consult, xrays, and the surgery it would cost approximately $1000.  I about died.  The second clinic in Spencer County, known for being extremely affordable, said they would do it for $60!!!  I couldn't get over the price difference.

We are going to wait until next Monday and see how she's doing.  If the skin is continuing to grow over the wound, we will wait and see if she can heal on her own.  If it's getting worse, than we will spend the $60 and chance the surgery.  If you feel the need to pray for any chickens over the next week, Sunny would take the prayers!  I'll post another update next week unless something drastically changes before then.  :)

I know, I know, she's just a chicken.  But we love her and I feel a responsibility to do everything (withing a reasonable limit) to help her survive.   

Enjoying some watermelon on a hot day!