Safeguard and Feather Damage While Molting

[KsKingBee]

I have been doing some searches for information on how much liquid Safeguard to give orally and came across a post warning not to use it during molt because it will mess up the feather growth. My question is and I am assuming that it will do the same with train feathers growing back in?

Also if anyone knows, how much liquid Safeguard, if I do use it, would I put in their mash per bird? I have hard water issues and have been recommended by my vet to put all meds in their food instead of the water.

 

[Garden Peas]

Quote: The liquid is less expensive.

-Kathy

​

Okay, I was seriously impressed by the necropsy photo -- not in a happy way

-- and spent this afternoon shopping and this evening doing math.

WARNING -- math follows. I recommend getting a heartening beverage before reading any further if math is not your most-favoritest topic...

I figured out the equivalent doses and cost per dose for the 10% liquid fenbendazole (Safe-guard goat dewormer), the 0.5% feed pellets/crumbles/top dressing (DuraFend, etc.), 10% paste horse/cattle dewormers, and just for giggles, dog granules (22.2%) and fish powder (pure, 250 mg packet). I also searched diligently for 0.05% medicated feed which was previously mentioned on this thread, but I could not find it listed or advertised anywhere.

To start with, I found some research abstracts that suggest that at least as far as cattle/horses go, the 10% wormers and 0.5% wormers have the same efficacy -- I am assuming they delivered equal amounts of the actual fenbendazole, and different volumes of product to get to the required dosage per kilo of animal, but I couldn't access the actual articles to verify. But I'm pretty sure that's what they did in the studies. Since it's all going in through the stomach... Didn't find anything that talked about absorption rates from different product formulations, but i didn't look very hard, since the other articles said both were equally effective. I don't have any reason to believe that one or the other will be absorbed significantly differently. But who knows? It's not like there's lots of published research on Peas

Here's the short answer. Yes, if you are buying the 1 liter bottles, the 10% liquid is cheaper than anything else I found -- but I think if you could find a 50 pound bag of the medicated feed, the price difference per dose probably wouldn't be very much, in what would be a similar quantity of effective doses. However, either way, that gets you around 400 doses... so it works for those of you with many peas, but would last me about a decade past the expiration date.

For those of us with small flocks, it probably comes down more to convenience and what method of delivery we can actually manage rather than cost per dose. In general, the liquid is the least expensive, the medicated feed is somewhere in the middle, and the paste wormers are a little bit higher. But if purchasing comparable quantities of doses, the prices don't vary as much as one might anticipate.

I also figured out that the dosage rate for turkeys published on the DuraFend 0.5 % medicated feed bag would require the bird to consume approximately 35 pounds of combined regular and medicated feed in order to get a 250 mg dose. Like the apocryphal 3 cc per gallon water recommendation, that turkey feed dosage on the bag would be unlikely to be effective -- at least not if our birds need a rate of 50 mg per kg to be effective. (That's about 10 times the dosing rate for livestock, btw, but that's the number I saw over and over again when I read all the threads I could find...) I took a couple photos of the bag, so if anyone wants to see that info, I can post the pix in another post. I'm really puzzled by this, but am thinking it is because they are feeding it as a sole food source over a period 6 days, and that it may have to do with the rate of clearance/excretion/breakdown from the turkey and the need to prevent overdosing? Anyway, I humbly don't think it would work.

I assumed a 250 mg dose of fenbendazole for cost-comparison purposes, based on all the recommendations. That is 2.5 ml of 10% liquid, 2.5 g of 10% paste, and is also 1.76 ounces BY WEIGHT (or 49.6 g) of 0.5% medicated feed. That's about 1/10 of a 1 lb medicated feed bag -- looking at the volume in the bag, my peas could probably, I think, each eat that in one meal without too much trouble, if they liked it. (Thinking a nice mash with egg or some cat food...) The 1 lb bag says that it has 2.27 g/lb, (0.45 kg), so the whole entire bag has 2270 mg of fenbendazole in it, or a little less than 10 individual bird doses. (When I saw it in the store, my plan was to do the 6 day turkey thing for a repeat dose in 10 days or so, but after doing the math, I don't think that will work. It will, however, work fine, I think, for single-dosing at the higher rate.)

If you are still reading (and have not passed out cold from the math yet), I found the 10% liquid for $22.99 at Tractor Supply. The 125 ml bottle will make about 50 doses, so that's about $0.46 per dose. It expires a year from now, and I probably won't be able to use it all before the expiration date. For those of you with big flocks, the 1 liter bottle (about 400 doses) works out to about $0.33 per dose. I couldn't find it for less than about $130, one place was only $120 but wanted $11 to ship...

The 0.5% medicated feed was $8.99 at TSC (and $7.49 online -- I need to go back with my receipt!), which works out to $0.90 (or $0.75) per 250 mg dose, and as mentioned above, is a little less than 10 doses in the bag. A 5 lb bag goes for $29.99 at TSC and was $23 at Amazon, for 45 1/2 doses, so about $0.50 - $0.65 per dose. I found a 10 lb bag online for $41.95 -- that would be about 91 doses at about $0.46 per dose -- almost identical to the cost per dose of the small bottle of liquid 10% Safe-Guard, for about twice as many doses. (The 5 lb bag makes about the same amount of doses as the 125 ml bottle, but as you can see, the cost per dose is slightly higher than the liquid.) I searched the whole darned bag for an expiration date and could not find one. Not sure what the shelf life is... that's a concern to me.

Fenbendazole 10% worming paste comes in 25g, 92g and 290g tubes. The prices I found were $9.99, $31.99 and $52.99, respectively, for about 10, 37 and 116 doses. Cost per dose works out to about $1 (for the small tubes), $0.86, and finally $0.46 per dose for the BIG tubes. It might be a little awkward breaking that down and trying to get it into that many birds...

I'm thinking I'd rather do math all night than try to paste worm 100 ******-off, frightened peas... But maybe it could be hidden in food?

And if you read this far, eager to hear about 22.2% dog granules, you can obtain 12 grams (packed as 3 packets of 4g each) for $16.99. That's 222 mg/g, so about 12 doses. I leave it to your imagination how to get those granules into a bird... Mash comes to mind, but at $1.42 per dose, there's cheaper ways to feed it in mash...

Pure fenbendazole is available in 250 mg packets (a single dose, mol) as a powder for fish. Three packets sell for $7.80, or $2.60 per dose, thus winning the award for the most expensive way to treat that I found.

It's too funny that the goat meds are the cheapest. I'd like to explain it as a reflection of the stature of goats

(since anything sold for horses is always expensive), but I bet it's just cheaper to make the liquid...

Anyway, I think this is the correct math for calculating the medicated feed (grain/alfalfa/pellet/crumble) dosing -- the thing on the bag is just weird. It says to mix the 1 lb bag of medicated feed into 313 lb of regular feed and give it to growing turkeys as the sole ration for six days. As I said above, it would take 34 1/2 lb of feed mixed at that ratio to get one 250 mg dose into a bird -- my peas definitely are not each eating 34 pounds of food per week, it's just not physically possible for them to consume that much... Since I wasn't at all sure how much they do eat per day, I worked it out backwards to see how much of it is needed to get an effective 250 mg dose... straight out of the bag, that's 1.76 ounces by weight. I don't know the volume measurement though -- it needs to be weighed out. I'd have to fool with a measuring cup and scale to figure out the volume, and doubt if it would be exactly the same across the different manufacturers. It's sold by weight.

I apologize to anyone who is now comatose and for any math or dosing errors... I'm still trying to assimilate all the information, so please forgive any mistakes. Hope this is somehow useful to someone besides me...

 

[Garden Peas]

Another Safeguard question. Sorry ya'll wanting to get this over with. I saw where a member posted we could use 3 CC per gallon of drinking water as long as it was the only water available. Will this work for the last 4 days? I'm home all day so could mix small batches of water. Just totally thrilled at this possibility. I have bad arthritis junk and it's been flaring in my hands the past few weeks. Typing isn't even easy=why I was wearing so much safeguard yesterday LOL

Sadly, no. Wouldn't that be convenient? That 3 ml per gallon info is out of date and not effective. @casportpony can give you more details if you like.

 

[zazouse]

I have never had any feather issues but with all meds sometimes things have a reaction or adverse effect, with all this rain i have been worming mine every other month and all feathers look great, even got small trains growing on a few of last years hatch that did not sell.

I think not worming them would have more of a damaging effect that worming

 

[casportpony]

The Safeguard or Panacur (both are 10% fenbendazole) dose I use to treat my peafowl for cecal and roundworms *only* is 50mg/kg (0.5ml per 2.2 pounds). Based on that, my peafowl get:

Large adult male - 3ml
Large adult female - 2ml
Small adult male - 2ml
Small adult female - 1.5ml
Large 3 month old chick - 1ml
Medium 3 month old chick - 0.8ml
Small 3 month old chick - 0.7
Above doses are for liquid *or* paste.

For capillary and gapeworms, worm for 5 days in a row.

According to a study I read and the recommendation of a vet, the most effective Valbazen dose is 20mg/kg (0.176ml per 2.2 pounds). Based on that, the Valbazen dose for peafowl would be:
Large adult male - 1.05ml
Large adult female - 0.7ml
Small adult male - 0.7ml
Small adult female - 0.53ml
Large 3 month old chick - 0.35ml
Medium 3 month old chick - 0.28ml
Small 3 month old chick - 0.25ml

Valbazen is 11.36% albendazole (113.6mg/ml)

Note that I did not include amounts for chicks under 3 months, but that's not because they cannot or should not be wormed, it's because I need to look up their weights on my computer.

I prefer to work all of mine orally, but I can understand why some people don't want to, and I guess if I had to choose between food or water or food, I'd choose food. To do that I would guess the weight of my flock in pounds or kg and do a little math. I would then most likely put the amount of Safeguard or Valbazen needed in some water, mix well and then I'd use that water to make a mash. I think Zazouse puts her wormer in eggs?

Hope this helps,
Kathy

Edited to add:
Safeguard or Valbazen, dose once, then ten days later.

Edited again to say that one must worm for 5 days in a row to treat capillary worms and gapeworms.

 

[casportpony]

I'm still looking for the "no Safeguard during molt" *source*... not because I don't believe it to be true, I just want to understand it better.

-Kathy

 

[casportpony]

I slept in line to see the Rolling Stones in '81.

-Kathy

 

[Garden Peas]

In doing further reading, apparently the fenbendazole leaves the system really fast -- within a day or so -- but I am also very curious now about this with regard to various wormers, and I'm still curious about the whole paste vs. liquid thing. If I can find answers, I will post them later.

In the meantime, we had a worming adventure here... I tried to figure out how to do it without stressing everybody out, and still make sure everyone got the right dose.

I was not confident that we could catch and administer oral meds without injuries, and I kept thinking if I tried the mash thing, I couldn't make sure that each bird got the correct amount of meds. I kept thinking that the more dominant birds would get a bigger share of the food, and the more picked-on birds might not get enough...

But the one thing that every bird in my pen loves above everything else is bread

So I experimented with how much liquid wormer could be soaked into a peafowl-sized piece of bread, and the same for the chickens.







I figured out that a piece of bread that the peas would chunk down in one gulp could hold about 0.5 ml of liquid goat wormer (10% fenbendazole). It soaks in easier if the bread is moist -- not dried out -- and if the bread chunk is thicker. It takes a few seconds or even a minute to really soak in. You can spread some on top and then kinda poke it into the inside of the chunk with the medicine syringe (no needle) once the bread starts getting soft and saturated.

I drew up 250 ml of wormer and divided it evenly between 5 pieces of bread, so each chunk had 0.5 ml, or about 50 mg of meds per bread cube, and a total of 250 mg for each of my medium-sized peas. (I figured I could also tailor the dose for each bird, by adding or subtracting a bread chunk, since there is actually a bit of difference in my bird sizes). That way I didn't have to predesignate which bread went to which individual bird, I could just throw the correct number of 50 mg pieces...

For chicken-sized pieces, I was able to put about 20 ml per bread bit, so again, I did 5 chunks per bird, anticipating an individual total dose of 100 mg. That's 1 ml divided onto 5 small bread triangles...



Here's the whole thing, all prepped and ready to go to the yard. The extra tub of plain bread is "diversion bread" -- to throw to other birds to draw them away from the target bird.

Lol I don't have any photos of feeding it -- my hands were full and my brain was overloaded, trying to keep count as to who had eaten what

The birds were VERY happy to grab it, except for initial concern from the peahen -- but she got over it and joined in happily after the first piece or two, which she lost to a quick chicken

I figured it was best to do it a breakfast time, when everyone would be looking for food. I started by tossing some scratch, just to break up the crowd and keep everybody spread out. Then, targeting one or two birds at a time (this was a challenge), I tossed the correct number of bread chunks, one at a time, until everyone had received a correct dose. It worked fairly smoothly with the chickens. It was a little harder with the peas, because the chickens darted in and carted off some of the pea's bread chunks. So I had to go back in the house to make a few extras (next time, I'll do that in advance!), and a couple of the chickens ended very heavily dosed

The diversion bread helped a lot, but the birds are quick! I monitored them closely for the rest of the day, and the good news is that everybody (including the heavily dosed chickens) is fine today. Water consumption was definitely a bit higher than usual yesterday, and there was maybe a little more scratching/grooming than usual yesterday evening, but nothing to a worrisome level. I did read that there can be a reaction with itchiness from the toxicity of the dying worms, but I haven't seen anything that appeared to be concerning. Everybody is totally fine this morning and eating well.

Anyway, this worked out okay with my tiny flock, so maybe it will work for someone else? My birds think the worming was a special treat session

And thanks again for posting that necropsy photo -- that's changed what we do here at my house, for sure. That picture was worth about ten thousand words -- WOW

 

[KsKingBee]

Thank you for posting this! Well I guess I should stop putting it in the water and just make a mash with it.

Okay so I would use this formula then? Or wait would I just add up this...
Alto - 3ml
Peep - 3ml
Frosty - 3ml
Ice - 2ml
Damsel - 2ml
Shyanne - 2ml
Snow White - 2ml

= 17ml of liquid safeguard? So that is 17ml daily and do I mix it with water or just keep it straight medicine into the mash?

What has worked well for me is to put the Safeguard in the water then put the water in the food. I did have a leg up as I was already feeding mash before I started the meds so I knew how much water I needed to how much feed to make the consistency I wanted. If you just dump the Safeguard into the feed there will be a glump of food with the meds, if you mix it into the water first it will be evenly distributed throughout all the mash.

I would feed the mash without the safeguard in it for a couple of days first to see how much feed they will clean up in one feeding. If I remember right you mentioned that you thought that they get tired of mash and will stop eating it after a while. I will mix things into mine to give them a change up. I will mix in really old bananas on one or two days a week, they really like mackerel so I mix a can in for 'Fish Friday' and 'Mackerel Monday'. Right now we have an abundance of rotting pears and apples, yep, into the mash, they love it. Celery and carrots diced breaks up the monotony as well as add to the beta carotene helping the feather color. Oh, and groats, aka steamed and rolled oats, they really like their oats and it is high in protein too.

Sorry if I am going on a bit, but mine really enjoy their mash and come in willingly every evening for supper and stay in all night. Then every morning they get their morning mash before enjoying the day free ranging.

 

[casportpony]

Again, no offense to the person(s) that created the list, but I have seen it referred to so many times now and I strongly believe that some things should be changed. How many people have wormed per those instructions and lost birds? KsKingBee sure did, let's not forget that! I know many of you have been worming this way for years without any problems, but I can guarantee you that many of you have also had sick and/or dead birds from following the info there.

-Kathy