Beak Injury

[amildiaz]

My ameraucana was injured by a fox today. Her upper beak is partially detached and its really difficult for me to make a detailed observation cause she's always keeping the injured side facing away from me. I don't know beak anatomy and I can't tell if it it's the whole upper beak or like an outer layer. A friend mentioned super glue.

This bird is so skiddish and afraid of me so I don't want to handle her until I have a game plan. It was getting close to sundown and I wasn't able to observe her eating or drinking. I'm not sure if she can but I will find out tomorrow. Any advice would be much appreciated!!

 

[alinas2010]

Oh no poor baby. I’m sorry this happened. It is unfortunate that she is skittish because she will need to be handled so you can check her over really well for wounds besides just her beak. How it is injured will somewhat determine how to proceed. Initially, I would rinse the injured part off with some saline. Hopefully it is just the top layer and we can come up with a plan to help stabilize it. Making her a watery, mushy feed will help her eat more comfortably as her beak heals. This link may help if you’re looking at an injury to the top layer:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/broken-open-beak.1337516/#post-21876931

Beaks have a lot of nerves and are very sensitive, so I’d imagine either way she is in a lot of pain and that is why she isn’t eating or drinking. If the damage is worse than just a layer or so, we will need to call on some more experienced folks, but you may be looking at tube feeding her.

She may be even more skittish right now after the attack, but it’s important that you get ahold of her to look her over after the attack. I recommend wrapping a towel around her body/wings in order to restrain her so you can look her over. Do not do this too tightly. Trying to pull her off the roost at roosting time to do this may work best since they don’t have good eyesight in the dark.

Let us know what you find when you get her looked over. Look very carefully under all her feathers and under her wings for wounds, bruising, puncture marks, etc.

 

[amildiaz]

here are some better photos