- Nov 14, 2012
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I love bullet points so...
Okay so my issue is this:
Two days ago I saw one of the OEG hens standing looking a bit wobbly, feathers fluffed up and eyes shut. I immediately picked her up and did another health check, this is two days after I had moved them. Her mites hadn't cleared up as well as the other two, so I took her inside to give her a warm bath in dog shampoo. She was then lightly blow dried and put into a guinea pig cage in the living room with towels, clean straw, water with dioralyte in it and some mash. Covered with a towel to keep it dark and then left alone.
In the morning (this morning) I moved her out of the little box with straw in and in front of the water. She drank loads and did an enormous poo that looked normal but large - but it had blood in it. Not a lot but pure blood. Not sure if it's her vent bleeding or if it's intestinal tract... There were no lumps of bits of intestine but just pure blood in the normal poo.
During today she just drank lots of water, pecked without lustre at some pumpkin, didn't touch her actual mash... She didn't actually eat anything. I washed her again in warm soapy water to dislodge some more of the weird scab things on her behind.
To try and describe it... Around her vent, inbetween her legs and on the base of the meaty bit of her tail, she had brown cracked crusty things, looked a lot like cooked chicken skin. Pin feathers were growing through it. Light brown in colour and CRAWLING with black mites. Most of it came off in the washes but some remained almost stuck to her skin, I didn't want to pull it off incase it's scabs and she starts bleeding. Not inflamed, no redness or swelling, just brown scabs on most of her behind. 90% of it is off now but some is attached to her skin and I'm reluctant to pull at it.
All the OEGs are also wheezing so I wonder if it's really bad worms and a really bad parasite infection in this one hens case. She smells a bit ammonia-y. She was a lot more active this morning in that she was drinking and had open eyes, but still shivvering and gaping occasionally. Sometimes she drooled. Now she won't open her eyes, can't stand up, feathers fluffed... Shallow breathing... I fear she won't last the night...
There might not be hope for her, but I want to know what is wrong. Do these symptoms sound familiar to anyone? Is it a mix of cocci and bad parasites? I can protect the rest of the flock and stop it from happening again if I know what it is that has made her so sick.
She is not dead yet of course! Is there anything more I can do for her other than just keep her warm and in the dark? She won't drink any more, can't stand, feathers fluffed...
I am in Scotland by the way incase you think climate might make a difference.
I can take a photo of her in her box but don't want to move her incase it causes more stress. She is breathing VERY shallowly.
- I kept the five bantams, a pekin cockerel, barbu d'uccles hen, old english game cock and two old english game hens in an aviary along with two red leg partridges and about a dozen or so quail.
- Three days ago I moved the bantams into a fenced off area in my veg patch with more space and a "wendy house" to roost in.
Very similar to this except they have a massive veg patch to roam in.
- They are fed a pheasant poult mix with high protein content as quail need higher protein than chickens and they are my main priority... I keep the chickens for yummy eggs but I keep quail for skins, meat and eggs. I also have a goose who has fed on the same stuff since she was old enough to go outside. It is good mix and they like eating it more than typical layers pellets or corn/grain mix. (Weird!)
- None of the bantams have ever laid an egg. I bought the OEGs in about sept and no idea how old they are but look poultish. The barbu is older but not sure how old.
- Their water is from an automatic watering system involving a header tank and then three drinkers spread around the aviary and veg patch. I pour a few glugs of ACV into the header tank once a month. The tank is plugged into the mains water and has a ballcock so refills when the water gets low... I scuff all the dirt and leaves out of the drinkers every fortnight or so but they don't tend to get particularly mucky.
- I bought the OEGs about the start of September but hatched the pekin and the barbu myself.
- For the first two nights all of the bantams stayed out in the cold and rain instead of going in the wendy house. My fault for not shutting them in. Tonight was their first night going into the wendy house themselves without me picking them up individually and placing them in it.
- When I moved them all into the veg patch I clipped their wings, did a health check and found small black mites living on JUST the OEGs. The barbu and pekin were clean. They were sprayed with anti-parasite spray meant for cockatiels and pigeons then put in the veg patch to preen and roam...
Okay so my issue is this:
Two days ago I saw one of the OEG hens standing looking a bit wobbly, feathers fluffed up and eyes shut. I immediately picked her up and did another health check, this is two days after I had moved them. Her mites hadn't cleared up as well as the other two, so I took her inside to give her a warm bath in dog shampoo. She was then lightly blow dried and put into a guinea pig cage in the living room with towels, clean straw, water with dioralyte in it and some mash. Covered with a towel to keep it dark and then left alone.
In the morning (this morning) I moved her out of the little box with straw in and in front of the water. She drank loads and did an enormous poo that looked normal but large - but it had blood in it. Not a lot but pure blood. Not sure if it's her vent bleeding or if it's intestinal tract... There were no lumps of bits of intestine but just pure blood in the normal poo.
During today she just drank lots of water, pecked without lustre at some pumpkin, didn't touch her actual mash... She didn't actually eat anything. I washed her again in warm soapy water to dislodge some more of the weird scab things on her behind.
To try and describe it... Around her vent, inbetween her legs and on the base of the meaty bit of her tail, she had brown cracked crusty things, looked a lot like cooked chicken skin. Pin feathers were growing through it. Light brown in colour and CRAWLING with black mites. Most of it came off in the washes but some remained almost stuck to her skin, I didn't want to pull it off incase it's scabs and she starts bleeding. Not inflamed, no redness or swelling, just brown scabs on most of her behind. 90% of it is off now but some is attached to her skin and I'm reluctant to pull at it.
All the OEGs are also wheezing so I wonder if it's really bad worms and a really bad parasite infection in this one hens case. She smells a bit ammonia-y. She was a lot more active this morning in that she was drinking and had open eyes, but still shivvering and gaping occasionally. Sometimes she drooled. Now she won't open her eyes, can't stand up, feathers fluffed... Shallow breathing... I fear she won't last the night...
There might not be hope for her, but I want to know what is wrong. Do these symptoms sound familiar to anyone? Is it a mix of cocci and bad parasites? I can protect the rest of the flock and stop it from happening again if I know what it is that has made her so sick.
She is not dead yet of course! Is there anything more I can do for her other than just keep her warm and in the dark? She won't drink any more, can't stand, feathers fluffed...
I am in Scotland by the way incase you think climate might make a difference.
I can take a photo of her in her box but don't want to move her incase it causes more stress. She is breathing VERY shallowly.
I really want to know what it was that killed her incase the rest of my flock have it and I can give them some meds while I work on balancing the soil they're on, did those symptoms sound familiar to anyone?
