Did coccidiosis kill my cockerel or could this be something else?

[Hippiefrog]

We lost our sweet 8 month old(4lb 4oz) Easter Egger cockerel, Patch, last night to suspected coccidiosis. Back story. Two days ago our 4 year old Isa started wheezing. I brought her inside to treat her. She is doing great now(I think her nostrils were clogged with dirt) but I noticed she had mites so I powdered her and the rest of the flock with poultry dust, then cleaned and sprayed the coop with permethrin 10. When I picked up our cockerel to powder him, he vomited a clear/brown liquid. I've seen them spit up before after drinking too much so I didn't think too much of it. That was until a couple of hours later at bedtime. He wasn't roosting as usual but was hiding tucked away in a nesting box. I promptly picked him up to separate him and he again vomited the same liquid. This time there was a lot more though. His crop also felt empty. When i put him in the crate, he ate and drank right away but still refused to roost on the branch I put in there. He just laid by the crate door all fluffed up. When I went to check on him later that night, I saw he had pooped a lot of liquid and saw drops of blood. See attached pic. This made me think of coccidiosis. I didn't have any Corid so my plan was to go to tsc first thing this morning to get some. Unfortunately, our guy was already gone when I went to check on him this morning(see pic of poop found after he had passed) I have since started the whole flock on Corid and all are seemingly fine. I will continue to treat for the 5 days required and will also continue to treat for mites(nasty little things). As you can see in the pic, our weather here in Virginia has been very rainy/muddy. We've had a lot of recent warm days too. I cannot keep the run dry to save my life so it's a muddy wet mess right now. Not sure what i can do about that until things dry up some. My questions are...does this in fact look and sound like coccidiosis? If it isn't, what else could cause bloody poop and vomiting? He was very healthy and I didn't see any mites on him when I went to powder him. The day before he was his usual spastic self, crowing all day as he loved to do, eating, drinking and jumping hens. It was very sudden. With that being said, my last question is, since he was sick, is it unsafe to bury him? I always bury my chickens in the garden but I've never lost one due to an infectious disease or illness, this is our first. He was one of the good guys though and deserves a proper burial. The garden is about 25' from the run and I'm able to bury him very deeply thanks to all of the rain we've had but would this be acceptable or too risky? Please let me know if there's any other questions I didn't answer in my post and thanks in advance!

 

[azygous]

I agree it's best not to post something you haven't researched yourself to determine if it's toxic to poultry. We have had tragic results here in the past from people passing on something they saw on a thread discussion somewhere. But Epsom salts is safe and effective treatment for crop disorders when the proper dosing is followed. I've used it myself with good results.

So many things could have caused the death of this young roo. Bleeding can be caused by worms, as @MysteryChicken mentioned. Or a screw or nail swallowed could cause it. Or it may have been intestinal shed and not blood. A necropsy is the only way to determine cause of death. Guessing rarely settles the matter.

A simple flock poop sample taken to your vet to run a fecal test for parasites is an inexpensive but conclusive way to find out if your flock needs to be treated for either worms or coccidiosis. Resorting to guessing is not necessary.

 

[MysteryChicken]

He could've had a worm overload.

 

[Eggcessive]

Sorry for your loss. In what state are you located? The best way to know what was wrong with him is to do a necropsy. The state vet labs do the best ones, complete with lab and tissue studies. I do home necropsies on hens I lose to look at the abdominal organs. If you can keep his body cold inside a cooler on ice (do not freeze) wrapped in garbage bags, you can take it or ship the body overnight via FedEx. Many labs will send you a shipping label. Many things are visible inside the belly, such as worms, coccidiosis, Mareks disease with spots and tumors on organs, crop and gizzard disorders, etc. If you do one take pictures. It may have been a crop disorder from the brown vomiting, a blocked gizzard, worms, or others. It is doubtful it was coccidiosis, but could have been if he had immunity problems. Here is a list of all state vets to contact:
https://www.metzerfarms.com/poultry-labs.html

 

[Eggcessive]

Here is a necropsy video, much more than you would need to do, but the organs are labeled:

 

[Eggcessive]

I am so sorry for your loss… I don’t think the cause was coccidiosis though. My friend lost his 4 Brahma pullets because of coccidiosis, their poop looked different, just a ’normal’ poop with lots of things that look like blood clots. Since he was vomiting and not even having diarrhea but just liqiuds, I suspect it would be something else.
I looked it up and vomiting brown liquid would indicate that he ate something bad, him having watery liquid-like discharge could be caused by parasites...
Again I am so sorry for your loss. I don’t think you could’ve done anything about it since it all happened so fast.

Actually, @jessejeanne , you may be right about it being a crop problem. Though I prefer to use chilled coconut oil, Colase, miconazole, or even acidified copper sulfate to treat crop problems, Epsom salts can be used, according to some poultry colleges, to flush a crop. Here is an example of that:
https://extension.umd.edu/resource/common-crop-issues-backyard-chickens/
Next time you suggest a treatment, just post the whole article or link. We all are entitled to giving our advice here, so keep it up. We may disagree with you, but if you have a link to back it up, it is perfectly welcome.

 

[Eggcessive]

The earlier you do the necropsy, the better, since autolysis (destruction of tissue by the body’s enzymes) or decay can occur. Many times the state vet can do more testing if the body is fresh. Do let us know of any findings.

 

[Eggcessive]

Many of us use Valbazen sheep and cattle wormer 1/2 ml given orally to each chicken, and then repeat it in 10 days to get the worm eggs that hatch. The other common one is SafeGuard Liquid Goat Wormer 1/4 ml per pound given orally for 5 days straight. If you only want to treat roundworms, it can be given once and repeated in 10 days.

 

[jessejeanne]

I am so sorry for your loss… I don’t think the cause was coccidiosis though. My friend lost his 4 Brahma pullets because of coccidiosis, their poop looked different, just a ’normal’ poop with lots of things that look like blood clots. Since he was vomiting and not even having diarrhea but just liqiuds, I suspect it would be something else.
I looked it up and vomiting brown liquid would indicate that he ate something bad, him having watery liquid-like discharge could be caused by parasites...
Again I am so sorry for your loss. I don’t think you could’ve done anything about it since it all happened so fast.

 

[nuthatched]

I am so sorry for your loss… I don’t think the cause was coccidiosis though. My friend lost his 4 Brahma pullets because of coccidiosis, their poop looked different, just a ’normal’ poop with lots of things that look like blood clots. Since he was vomiting and not even having diarrhea but just liqiuds, I suspect it would be something else.
I looked it up and vomiting brown liquid would indicate that he ate something bad, him having watery liquid-like discharge could be caused by parasites...
Again I am so sorry for your loss. I don’t think you could’ve done anything about it since it all happened so fast.

Epsom salt can be harmful if taken internally, it will not be effective for sour crop.