#STARTER FLUID EUTHANASIA UPDATE#

He had pictures of his other hens running around his property, so I think he was legit.Īlso, I can verify (from a couple of subsequent experiences) that taking a chicken off the roost at night and dispatching her with inversion, cone, and scalpel blade was calm and quiet without trauma.įinally, in dealing with a rat invasion in the coop, I found that a very simple and entirely painless way of dispatching rats from live traps is to put the whole trap into a box and then pipe in pure nitrogen from a welder's tank until all the air is displaced. I did locate a guy who wanted those hens even though I made it clear they were past their primes. They just did regular chicken stuff before, during, and after the dose.

#STARTER FLUID EUTHANASIA UPDATE#

It's been 4 years since I posted the original question, and I thought I should update about the solutions I've come up with since then.įirst of all, as to the original hens I wrote about: 1)No ill effects from the Valium experiment. Result: six hens standing around looking stoned but nowhere near asleep or unconscious. Then, based on some posts in this subreddit, I tried a similar maneuver with crushed Benadryl, about 100 mg per bird. Absolutely no effect, presumably because chickens don't have enough cerebral cortex to let it work. Ideally, I want the whole group seriously sedated before proceeding.įirst I tried a (big) dose of Valium crushed up and hidden in a hamburger ball. But for six at once, I don't want to traumatize the birds who are waiting their turns. Now I've killed sick or injured birds, and with individual birds I've made it quick and as painless as possible. I've wrestled with this decision for the past two years, and feel it's necessary. I've got six elderly hens who've lived long happy lives scratching around our half-acre, who are going to have to make way for a new and larger flock and for major renovations of the roost and laying boxes. This may not be a popular post, but I've got to ask.

Starter fluid euthanasia