Sick quail please help!

Crofters Quail

Chirping
6 Years
Jan 28, 2015
37
7
79
Brisbane, Australia
Hi, I'm a newbie to quail and forums but my sick quail has prompted me to action. I have a 6 month old female jap quail who I noticed was limping around this afternoon.

She seems lethargic, breathing is heavy but not fast,. She is sitting up and holding her head up but is hobbling around and reluctant to move much. Her feathers seem a little dishevelled and she is not always holding her wings up properly. She is also a little wet under the beak. I have isolated her and brought her inside. She ate a little and drank a little and managed her mealworms but took a while to swallow them and didn't get excited and wasn't able to move much to get the worms. I think her appetite is down compared to usual. She is mainly just sitting around in a corner looking miserable and I fear for her.

Her eyes are clear but she seems tired and her eyes are a bit droopy at times.

I live in Brisbane and we have just had excessive temps of 38 c then storms and lots of rain. The quail are usually well covered with corrugated plastic and a tarp in the rain but I was in hospital with my son and my husband was looking after the quail. I think their feed might have got slightly wet but nothing major. Hubby also my not have cleaned out the set up as often as I do. The quails feet looked ok...no poop balls...they are on wire...but I keep wondering whether a foot infection could be responsible because of the limping? Or something else???

Any thoughts or advice from all you quail gurus out here would be so much appreciated as I really don't want to lose my little quail....her name is Tamarind.

Many thanks in advance,
 
Just can't go to sleep and leave her...she seems to be deteriorating....slow laboured breathing....puffy looking feathers....closing her eyes....but still sitting and responsive....no evidence of suspicious droppings though....and laid and egg today.....poor little thing.......please help....any idea what is up???
 
Inspect her head carefully for wounds. Typically limping in brought on by a wound to that leg or the head. Look carefully over the bottom of her foot for knots or lumps that could mean the start of bumblefoot.

When you say she looks ruffled do you mean that she is keeping all her feathers fluffled? are her wings hanging all the time or does she pick them up?

Be sure however that she is limping and that her leg isn't paralyzed. Prick the leg lightly with a pin and see what her reaction is.

Listen to her breathing and look and smell carefully around her beak and nostrils. Is there any swelling or discharge? Do you notice a distinct foul smell?

What does her feces look like currently?

It's ok to feed her whatever she'll eat at this point. Meal worms, crackers, seeds, whatever she'll actually put down, so she'll have some strength.

Add some sugar to her water for now, when you can get to a pet store and buy a liquid vitamin supplement for birds like vita-sol or sav-a-chik. Anything to get her some nutrition until we can figure out whats wrong.
 
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Very many thanks, chicken obsessed for your helpful reply. I've just done my 3.30am check on her. She I was sleeping but I was able to rouse her and she put her head up but she is very still. Her feathers are unkempt looking and wings are drooping.

Her breathing is silent but slow and if she moves around you can notice her little body rising and falling on each breath....it's what doctors describe as increased work of breathing. There isn't any smell. I noticed earlier however, that the feathers under her chin seemed a bit dampish and bits and pieces of sand etc from her sand box were sticking to her beak.

Over the last 8 hours there has been a small amount of normal looking faeces. I did note a small amount of yellow runny looking mucous lying on its own in her hospital cage. Not sure if it's bile or something else ??? Or which end it's from. Anyway the stuff didn't look too good...

I didn't pick her up or try pricking her feet as I didn't have the heart to disturb her too much at 3.30am but will investigate further once the sun is up...in a couple of hours.

Once again, I'm so thankful for the response and the helpful advice.
 

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