It's been a long process. It began a couple months ago with a very serious infected scale on her talon. She was very sick with infection, running a fever and not budging from the corner of the run where she'd planted herself. I scraped out the scale after a long soak in epsom salts and bandaged it up.
I pulled her back from the brink with a round of antibiotics only to have her get another infection from a minor scrape on top of that toe not soon after. After another round of antibiotics, she was almost back to normal, but the talon was going through a strange metamorphosis.
Alice is a six-year old SLW hen and she's stuck in molt on top of her toe doing this strange number. It began turning black and the upper part began amassing tissue behind it. I guessed that her body was rejecting the toe because it had gone through too much tissue destruction with two infections plus the removal of her nail at one point.
Then yesterday, I saw the foot was giving her a lot of problems and the toe was pointing upward at an unnatural angle. So I brought her in and the final result was the toe easily detached when I manipulated it.
You can see how the tissue behind the dead toe has mushroomed. So I cleaned it with Betadine and rinsed it in epsom salt solution, then packed it with antibiotic ointment and bandaged it, then put her in her favorite nest box where she's been sleeping at night since it's been hard for her to roost with that deformed talon.
So now I wait and keep an eye on the wound for infection. I'll give it another good cleaning later on today, and leave the bandage off tonight, giving the stump a lot of air to form a scab.
I am hoping it won't get infected, that her body has done a good job of walling off the self amputation, and that maybe some of the swelling might go down over the next few weeks.
I'm very fond of Alice, as you might be able to tell. She's met a lifetime of challenges with courage and determination, and I'm banking on her meeting this one with flying colors, too.
I pulled her back from the brink with a round of antibiotics only to have her get another infection from a minor scrape on top of that toe not soon after. After another round of antibiotics, she was almost back to normal, but the talon was going through a strange metamorphosis.
Alice is a six-year old SLW hen and she's stuck in molt on top of her toe doing this strange number. It began turning black and the upper part began amassing tissue behind it. I guessed that her body was rejecting the toe because it had gone through too much tissue destruction with two infections plus the removal of her nail at one point.
Then yesterday, I saw the foot was giving her a lot of problems and the toe was pointing upward at an unnatural angle. So I brought her in and the final result was the toe easily detached when I manipulated it.
You can see how the tissue behind the dead toe has mushroomed. So I cleaned it with Betadine and rinsed it in epsom salt solution, then packed it with antibiotic ointment and bandaged it, then put her in her favorite nest box where she's been sleeping at night since it's been hard for her to roost with that deformed talon.
So now I wait and keep an eye on the wound for infection. I'll give it another good cleaning later on today, and leave the bandage off tonight, giving the stump a lot of air to form a scab.I am hoping it won't get infected, that her body has done a good job of walling off the self amputation, and that maybe some of the swelling might go down over the next few weeks.
I'm very fond of Alice, as you might be able to tell. She's met a lifetime of challenges with courage and determination, and I'm banking on her meeting this one with flying colors, too.
