How to t feed a sick chicken and give subcutaneous fluid

[casportpony]

How much food and fluid is she getting? FWIW, I have a 1kg Leghorn that's really thin and she gets 120ml of food/water twice a day.

-Kathy

 

[SaraT]

Before the loose poop started I was only getting around 100 mls of fluid into her a day, then when I found the recommendation of 50mg/kg/day I got a little closer to that. Now I've been giving closer to 200 mls per day. I don't know if I should switch back and forth, but some days I would skip a feeding and give her SQ fluids just to see if she would get hungry again or I'd get tired of sticking needles in her and I'd do an extra feeding.

I do have a question then that you may be able to answer for me, what volume can I crop feed a 2.2kg hen? I was worried at first, so I was only giving her 30mls at a time. I've since increased that to 60 mls since that's what fits in a syringe. I have access to plenty of books, I guess I should try harder to figure out calorie-wise how much I should be feeding her.


Thanks for the info on Panacur. I am a vet tech so I much prefer specific dosages! I've just been a little overwhelmed trying to figure everything out, so I keep thinking, oh yeah, I should have done this or should have done that.

 

[casportpony]

Each bird is different, but I can almost always get 120ml baby bird food into a 2kg bird, but obviously I do less if they're unable to stand, 'cause any pressure on a very full crop can cause them to vomit and aspirate. If I'm tubing just fluid, I stick with the recommendation from the book set "Clinical Avian Medicine", which says to hydrate orally at 30ml/kg every 6-8 hours.

Lots of vet tech stuff here: http://avianmedicine.net/​

Source:http://avianmedicine.net/content/uploads/2013/03/07_emergency_and_critical_care.pdf​

FLUID THERAPY
Oral Administration
Oral administration is the ideal method of giving fluids.
This method is more commonly used in mildly dehydrated
birds or in conjunction with subcutaneous (SC)
or intravenous (IV) therapy. Oral rehydration (30 ml/kg
PO q 6-8 h) also may be used in larger birds (eg, waterfowl)
that are difficult to restrain for parenteral fluid​

therapy.

ORAL NUTRITIONAL SUPPLEMENTS
Below are listed some of the oral nutritional supplements
that can be gavage-fed to debilitated birds. Various
hand-feeding formulas are on the market and, as a
whole, are far superior to the homemade formulas used
decades ago that contained monkey biscuits, peanut butter
and ground seeds. Commercially available hand-feeding
formulas for baby birds are often utilized in the treatment
of sick and debilitated adult birds. The quantity
that can be fed at one time to a sick bird is greatly
reduced from that of baby birds. On the average, a baby
parrot can accommodate 10% of its body weight per
feeding due to the elasticity of the crop and its rapid
emptying. Adult birds have a greatly decreased crop
capacity, averaging 3% of their body weight. Additionally,
sick birds are less tolerant of food in the crop and care
must be taken to avoid regurgitation and/or aspiration.
A sick or debilitated bird should always have its
hydration corrected prior to attempting to initiate​

oral gavage-feeding.

 

[casportpony]

FYI, the fenbendazole info came from Plumb's Veterinary Drug Handbook.



-Kathy

 

[SaraT]

Kathy, thank you so much for your advice! All of this information makes me feel so much better about tube feeding.

I will probably keep going with the sucralfate for another day or two since it's unlikely to do any harm and my hen did stop stretching her neck and opening her mouth. I was worried that I had irritated either the back of her mouth or her esophagus from not having her neck straight enough, but after two weeks, I have pretty well perfected my technique!

I will probably gradually increase the amount I feed at one time since it makes me too nervous to just double the total volume. I think I will try feeding her in the afternoon and at midnight when I get home from work, that way she might be a little more likely to eat when I put her out with the other chickens in the morning. I'm thinking right now I'll go back to feeding her twice a day for the next 3 days while I deworm, then again try to slow down the feedings to see if she will begin to eat or drink.

 

[SaraT]

So I just wanted to post an update. After getting more food into my hen by feeding her more at a time with the tube (also deworming her for 3 days at 30 mg/kg) the character of her feces improved to nearly normal and she is eating on her own! She started eating pretty well yesterday, but I tubed her last night since she had lost weight over the course of the day.

I will continue to monitor her weight for the next week or so. I'm glad she is well, because now I mush spend my free time predator proofing my chicken enclosure. There was a skunk in the chain link dog kennel where the chickens live last night. I can't even figure out how I got in!! I'm thinking I'll put electric around the kennel today.

 

[casportpony]

Thanks for the update, glad to hear that she might be getting better! Hey, I just had a thought, maybe the neck thing was because she had gapeworms and you worming took care of that?

-Kathy

 

[SaraT]

I have no experience with gape worm. I'm sure it's a possibility, but there were no other respiratory signs and she didn't appear to be having any trouble breathing. Either way, I think de-worming her was definitely the way to go and I'll probably be quicker in the future to de-worm any birds that start to look a little off.

Todays update:
I kept her in the cage inside last night and when I got up this morning she was eating! The first time she's eaten anything inside! Also, her weight this morning was probably about what it would have been post feeding last night. I'll weigh her again this evening to see if she needs another supplemental feeding.

 

[tagamigi]

My chicken was fine yesterday we called her big red. Then today she was wheezing and lying down. I started treating her right away 5 hrs she was gone . She was such a good chicken laid an egg at 2 hours. So that wasn't the problem. We have had a lot of rain. I am worried about the others what should I do

 

[casportpony]

Sorry for your loss... Where do you live?

-Kathy