Hello all. Dealing with some four day old salmon faverolles chicks that arrived yesterday—they were all in good health except this one, who was on deaths door when she arrived. At first I thought she was full of fluid, but as the day progressed I realized it was air—a lot of it!
I used these forums to find out about subcutaneous emphysema in chickens, and promptly used a spare and empty diabetic needle to remove the air (we have a lot of spares, we’ve had to remove air about 4 times now) and apply neosporin afterwards.
But the problem is she keeps refilling and getting ridiculously huge! The air bubble will reach from her neck to her belly to her side and even her back on her right side. I wanted to just leave it and see if she recovers, but she is so small and the air bubble is so huge that it worries me.
I should note that she once deflated on her own. She went from balloon chick to normal chick in about 2 minutes. But I can’t induce this as it seems to happen at random. Has anyone else had this problem with a ballooning chick? Is there anything else I can do to help her? I’m willing to do this as many times as she needs, but I’m afraid she will get to this huge size when I’m sleeping and I won’t be there in time to puncture her. She is running and eating and breathing fine, but begins to waddle when she gets too huge.
Attached are the photos of her before deflation and afterwards.
I used these forums to find out about subcutaneous emphysema in chickens, and promptly used a spare and empty diabetic needle to remove the air (we have a lot of spares, we’ve had to remove air about 4 times now) and apply neosporin afterwards.
But the problem is she keeps refilling and getting ridiculously huge! The air bubble will reach from her neck to her belly to her side and even her back on her right side. I wanted to just leave it and see if she recovers, but she is so small and the air bubble is so huge that it worries me.
I should note that she once deflated on her own. She went from balloon chick to normal chick in about 2 minutes. But I can’t induce this as it seems to happen at random. Has anyone else had this problem with a ballooning chick? Is there anything else I can do to help her? I’m willing to do this as many times as she needs, but I’m afraid she will get to this huge size when I’m sleeping and I won’t be there in time to puncture her. She is running and eating and breathing fine, but begins to waddle when she gets too huge.
Attached are the photos of her before deflation and afterwards.
