For you folks who have hens die but never open up your birds to find out if you can see the reason why, I encourage you to do so if you ever want to learn, really learn, about chickens. I know it's gross and especially if you really liked the chicken, it's hard, but it's worth it if you will ever learn how to prevent illness, suffering, parasites, etc. in your flocks.
Here's another hen that was kept well past her laying life by my sister, who will NOT kill a chicken, even when they are suffering horribly...she just keeps them for years until predators get them or they die of illness related to aging out of laying. She's had a LOT of birds die over the years and never had a clue as to why, though the descriptions she gives me of the symptoms prior to death, all were preventable by just culling her flock on a regular basis. Oh, she'd try to give them antibiotics and such and sometimes that extended their life a month longer, but eventually the reproductive issues caught up with them again.
Death is death and all creatures will die~us included~but being able to control the nature of the dying is the gift a human can give their animals. It's called stewardship and it's our responsibility, once taking on the care and life of another creature, to insure they have a good life and a good death.
This hen had severe reproductive cancer that had spread throughout her abdomen, was attached to all her organs and even the walls of her body cavity. When she arrived here I noticed her comb was purple, she had a massive abdomen and she was gasping for breath, but she died before I could even give her the hand of mercy.
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I had hawks take 2 of mine, some years ago. One tried to take some of a broody hen's chicks one day. I heard a commotion and ran outside, just in time to see the hawk take off empty handed and the hen shaking out her feathers and calling her chicks back to her. We didn't see that hawk again lol
