Treatment for Peahen with possible infection

[casportpony]

Is this the same hen that was sick about a year ago?

-Kathy

 

[Garden Peas]

It really depends on what you are needing to treat for as to what drug and dosage you need to administer.

When treating for round worms or cecal worms with Safeguard a single day dosage of two ml per adult peahen or three ml per adult peacock given orally and repeated in ten days is sufficient. If however you are trying to get all types of worms it is a five-day treatment and repeated in ten days. Documentation is posted on the previous page.

The problem you are facing is that you don't know what you need to treat for. You could rule out a lot of things with a fecal exam.

I would click "thumbs up" on this if I could, but I wore out my clicker on the home parasitology thread this morning.

I totally, 100%, completely agree with @KsKingBee here.

 

[Trefoil]

As Cathy has pointed out, the way to tell if an animal is sick is to keep track of its weight.
oil of oregano is a potent anti fungal, as well as an antibiotic, and anti bacterial and is usually used in conjunction with probiotics. Unless she is still losing or not gaining weight I would concentrate on giving her enough of the proper diet and continue to monitor her weight/condition. I personally prefer to feed the higher protein (28%) gamebird because I also feed fermented feed and tend to add everything but the kitchen sink to it and this allows me not to worry about lowering the protein too much. Because wormers are notorious for becoming ineffective over time,what works great for me this year may not work for you (in a different location or dosage) at all. That makes it imperative that you check your results via a fecal done after worming every year or two. The best would be to check before and a week or two after, but if you can only do it once, then do it to make sure the wormer you are using is working. If you are dosing with ivermectin on the skin, it MUST be applied on the skin, not the feathers.

 

[Birdrain92]

Ok I would rule out cocci and probably blackhead. The oregano oil kills cocci, that much is confirmed by studies. I would stop with it though right now, it CAN deplete magnesium and she might need to rebuild gut flore/good bacteria. I have had luck with it with keeping blackhead at bay too, with multiple doses so that is also unlikely. Even if it was fungal it should have taken care of that. I use it too, for a lot of things.

I would be worried about getting more magnesium and calcium in her system, ok? Make sure she has grit AND oyster shell available. You might crush some TUMS up in her food, it will give her a calcium boost. I believe calcium and magnesium go hand in hand, any ideas on boosting magnesium levels people?

Magnesium helps absorb calcium as well as vitamin D. Vitamin D can be from being in the sunlight, magnesium can be found in your leafy greens, seeds, and legumes like alfalfa and clover. Plants need magnesium so it would also make sense that plants will have it but some plants, as the ones I listed are higher in magnesium as well as others.

 

[KsKingBee]

About to lay an egg stance;

 

[casportpony]

She is currently on my roof for the night, i will see if i can catch her pooping tomorrow and take a pic. Can i hurt her while massaging? I felt like i was moving that gravel stuff around quite a bit.

You really need to get her locked up so you can see all of her poop. I would not massage without tubing water first.

 

[CrazyBirdLady7]

Doesn't look like the wax worms are digesting properly.

 

[Garden Peas]

Well, I'm not going to guarantee there isn't anything medically wrong -- check w/ @casportpony . I'll try to reread your post tonight, too. But my first thought here is that she looks as though she's getting ready to lay. Did she lay last summer at all? Have you checked for an egg?

I agree, the poops don't look normal.

What on earth is a "wax worm"??? If you mean something like dried mealworms, I wouldn't give a lot of those to a bird that wasn't feeling well. I think they can get impacted.

You said she lives indoors... does she get grit? What does she eat?

How did you know it was a fungal infection last time?

 

[casportpony]

Poop is not normal. Would be best to have it checked by a vet for worm eggs, coccidia, bacteria and yeast. You said she had a fungal infection before. Was this confirmed by a vet? Get basleline weight on her, then weigh her at the same time every morning.

FYI, fenbendazole in the water won't treat all worms. Best to give her Safeguard liquid or paste at 0.23 ml per pound orally for *5* consecutive days. IMO, Duramycin 10 (tetracycline) is junk, better to treat with something like Baytril.

-Kathy

 

[casportpony]

FWIW, I took my hen to the dog/cat vet, who knows *zero* about poultry or peafowl, but he was a good sport and looked at the poop for me. My hen had poop that looked a lot like your hen's poop, was passing undigested seed, and had a crop that wasn't emptying. In her poop he found lots of flagellates and a few clostridia. He suggested that I treat with metronidazole, Baytril, give fluids and tube feed.

-Kathy