Cracked beak: vet or wait?

[nestleaver1]

Looking for advice as this is a first for me: noticed my lovely young White Sussex had a purplish beak and realised she has a crack on one side. No idea what she has flown into to do that but she is a bit fearless/adventurous sometimes. Her beautiful beak had only just grown back properly after the farmer had 'trimmed' it for her...

There is no bleeding but it's clearly bruised/damaged. I have cleaned it with antiseptic and she has gone to bed as usual. A few head-shakes but otherwise behaving normally and pecking at things.
So the question is - does she need vet attention to repair the crack or is that pointless and I should just leave it to heal, keeping an eye for infection? I don't fancy the superglue idea but considering a repair with a sliver of nylon bicycle patch - thin, seethru and sticky. Might just stabilise it enough??

Any advice considering the extent of the injury greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Kate

 

[Chloe+chickens=LOVE]

I would go to the vet just because it is a little to close to the beak connects

 

[Brahma Chicken5000]

@casportpony @KikisGirls @azygous have you guys ever dealt with something like this before?

 

[SimsFarmFresh]

Check this out, gives a good step by step: http://www.the-chicken-chick.com/repairing-chickens-broken-beak/

 

[Kiki]

I would leave it be.
I believe some people have used super glue before.
I think that it super glue is cray cray. Do you know how easy it is to glue your own fingers together?
I do.

 

[azygous]

I would read how the Chicken Chick uses the thin paper from a tea bag to make a patch to fit over the crack and glue it in place with a drop of super glue gel. This would serve to hold the beak together while it knits back together.

The bruising is producing considerable pain. A baby aspirin morning and again at night will help her deal with the pain.

 

[nestleaver1]

Thank you so much lovely people! I did read Chicken Chick's article but agree with kikisgirls that there is too much can go wrong with that idea. She seems happy this morning. Will give her some aspirin in moistened pellets so she can def eat something.

Further comments/votes very welcome!
XXXX

 

[Shezadandy]

It's amazing how quick they are able to heal beaks. Since she's got blood under there, I would just flush it as well as you can with Vetricyn- when I had my a beak injury I added a little neosporin by the crack to keep the flesh part moist. And I would definitely avoid sealing it with super glue- if there wasn't any blood I would consider it. I think that fix has its time and place, but if there's bleeding/dry blood, I think sealing it up would cause more harm than good. I know you're not considering the super glue- I'm adding this in so if someone else does a search on this in the future- they'll have that to think about.

 

[Shezadandy]

Here's what we had to deal with - with a gentle wiggle you could displace the entire thing on that side. I trimmed off any excess that would get caught on things (this photo was post-trim, post flush, post-neosporin) on anything - then flushed the thing as many times as she would tolerate with Vetricyn- you can see the big purple v shaped bruise in the lower beak, and added neosporin just along the crack to keep it from drying out and also to prevent infection. I want to say it only took a week, maybe 2 at the very longest.

 

[nestleaver1]

Thanks Shesadandy! That looks similar to but much worse than my girl so that's very reassuring. I'll give her a squirt of antibiotic liquid every so often. She's laying just now so I'll get her after for aspirin too. When I was cleaning it with diluted TCP, every time she moved her head she managed to put it straight in her eye so def not wanting to try superglue! xx