Baby chick injury

[Chickmama84]

Hello!

We brought home a new chick yesterday. We noticed right away she was limping. My husband looked at her but didn’t see anything. We looked at her again more closely tonight and saw what looks like a cut on the inside of her leg. We messaged the person we got her from, and she said an Epsom salt soak and neosporin. She also said we could bring her back and she would replace her. I’m a want to fix the problem kind of person and wanted to see if anyone agreed with the recommended treatment and if you had any experience with this. Any help is much appreciated. We have around 15 chickens and have never had to deal with this before.

 

[Wyorp Rock]

Welcome To BYC

Is it a cut or perhaps something got wrapped around the leg? Take a really close look to make sure there's not a string, hair, feather, etc. embedded in the wound that needs to removed from the wound.

An epsom salts soak is o.k. and applying triple antibiotic ointment to the wound would be fine.
Hopefully she'll heal up o.k. but it's hard to know if the leg has been damaged and she may limp all her life. Time will tell on that.

The wound looks to be already healing, so monitor it closely for any oozing, pus, bad odors. If you notice any of that, then switch to swabbing it with Chlorhexidine, let that dry on the wound, then apply your ointment.

 

[Chickmama84]

Welcome To BYC

Is it a cut or perhaps something got wrapped around the leg? Take a really close look to make sure there's not a string, hair, feather, etc. embedded in the wound that needs to removed from the wound.

An epsom salts soak is o.k. and applying triple antibiotic ointment to the wound would be fine.
Hopefully she'll heal up o.k. but it's hard to know if the leg has been damaged and she may limp all her life. Time will tell on that.

The wound looks to be already healing, so monitor it closely for any oozing, pus, bad odors. If you notice any of that, then switch to swabbing it with Chlorhexidine, let that dry on the wound, then apply your ointment.

Thank you so much for your input. I hope she will be okay too.

 

[Chickmama84]

Thank you so much for your input. I hope she will be okay too.

Welcome To BYC

Is it a cut or perhaps something got wrapped around the leg? Take a really close look to make sure there's not a string, hair, feather, etc. embedded in the wound that needs to removed from the wound.

An epsom salts soak is o.k. and applying triple antibiotic ointment to the wound would be fine.
Hopefully she'll heal up o.k. but it's hard to know if the leg has been damaged and she may limp all her life. Time will tell on that.

The wound looks to be already healing, so monitor it closely for any oozing, pus, bad odors. If you notice any of that, then switch to swabbing it with Chlorhexidine, let that dry on the wound, then apply your ointment.

We ended up taking her to a vet today who sees birds/chickens. It was too swollen for us to really get a good look. She ended up having a rubber band around her leg. They removed it and washed her wound. We had been in touch with the lady we got her from and last night she messaged my husband asking how she was doing. He told her whatever it was it was going completely around her leg and that’s when she mentioned to us she uses rubber bands to mark her males So now we are wondering if she is actually a he. Awaiting confirmation. Hopefully the chick won’t have any long term effects from this, but you were definitely right there was a foreign object embedded. Thanks for your help. If it hadn’t been for you I’m not sure we would’ve even thought about something being caught around the leg. We appreciate it so so much.

 

[Wereplatypus]

Super glad the chick is ok, I wouldn't have thought about something being wrapped around it either. If it is a male when you were expecting a pullet, I hope the lady you got the chick from can make it right since she gave you an injured bird that was already sexed as male.

 

[Chickmama84]

Super glad the chick is ok, I wouldn't have thought about something being wrapped around it either. If it is a male when you were expecting a pullet, I hope the lady you got the chick from can make it right since she gave you an injured bird that was already sexed as male.

I misspoke and it’s only a certain breed of males she marks, which we don’t think is that breed. When we first told her about it, she offered to give us a replacement or our money back, but my husband and I were so concerned about the welfare of the chick if we gave it back that we just decided to keep and try to help it. It is already doing sooooo much better. I’m going to try and convince my husband that it needs to be a house chicken after the money that was spent on it today, but I don’t think he will go for that

 

[Wyorp Rock]

I'm glad you were able to see the vet and find the rubber band!

Hopefully the leg will heal up just fine now.

AND Hopefully if you were expecting a pullet, the chick is one, you'll get attached either way, but if you are unable to keep a cockerel, it will make it much harder to rehome or send him back.