Chicken Emergency

Yesterday I was herding the chickens back into their enclosed run when I noticed that Big Martha was bleeding. She is the flightiest of our chickens, and it was a pain to catch her. When I did I found that she had a pretty big gash on the end of her back, about 1" by 2". It was really gross. I couldn't figure out what in the world could have happened. They were only out for an hour and Jeff was sitting at the kitchen table and didn't hear any squawking. I took her inside and wrapped her up in a towel so she couldn't flap her wings. She was actually pretty calm. Jeff helped me hold her while I washed out the wound and used hydrogen peroxide and neosporin. I tried to wrap it up but of course she was having none of that. After talking to my friend Linda, we think it was a skunk that attacked her from behind. We have had skunks in our neighborhood in the daytime, which according to the Animal Control people is not out of the ordinary and does not mean they are rabid. Linda said that skunks are vicious and nasty and really bad around chickens. Now Big Martha has to be on chicken lock-down because the others peck at the wound, the chicken version of kicking someone while they are down. She will have to stay caged up til she gets better. I made her a little living space which we have dubbed the 'double wide trailer,' which is two storage bins zip-tied together with an opening between them.