Blood and clots in 18 week old pullet

[Tootsie]

This one is 18 weeks old and her siblings were killed by a fox at another barn I manage so I brought her and 2 younger 10 week old ones here to my farm so they wouldn't be next. I also brought 3 adults and put them in the barn.

I put her & the 2 younger ones in with my silkies. I thought I saw a tiny amount of blood Friday evening but wasn't sure so I cleaned it up. They were locked in an outside run with 2 male & 2 female silkies Friday afternoon while we were working on the coop inside. Could it be a male forcing her (don't know if he did?) that caused the blood or should I treat her with the milk or something?

Then when I went in Sunday morning there was a lot of blood & clots on the ground but she isn't acting sick and everyone else is fine. I put her in a crate by herself and cleaned the area with bleach before anyone else could go there.

Nobody else has blood and hers seems to be slowing down. I looked at her vent and no blood stains and she is white.

I just put white paper towels under her perch since she is now in a wire bottom crate and it will make it easier to tell if there is still blood.

ANy thoughts on what this is and what to do? All my flock including her always get medicated chick starter until at least 7 weeks old.

Thank you for your input.

 

[threehorses]

I'm confused - is the blood in her droppings at all? Or just droplets of blood on the ground?

If in her droppings, use Corid or Sulmet in their water as labeled. If you use Sulmet, give them yogurt daily for a week and then for 2 weeks thereafter.

Medicated chick starter - do you mean medicated with amprolium? If you do, the amprolium amounts in medicated starter are "coccidiostat" amounts - in other words designed to head off bid problems.

However, coccidiostat won't always work to keep a problem from happening. If so, then you use a coccidiocide (designed to flat out kill cocci) like the Corid (which is stronger strength amprolium, in a '-cide' strength), or Sulmet.

Hope this helps.

 

[Tootsie]

Well the only way to describe how it looked yesterday morning is it looked like she had her period, I saw no stool mixed in. Now today there are faint amounts of pink in the stool, but nothing at all like yesterdays solid clots and blood. I can email a picture of today to someone but to post it here takes so long going through that photobucket since I am on dial up.

I have the medicated chick on hand also. It has amprolium in it yes.

 

[sammi]

keep an eye on her droppings or for any more blood spots..

when you see her droppings..describe..color and consistency..

make sure she is kept clean of blood or mess..she'll attract flies and end up with maggots.

I'd have the cocci med on hand anyway..just in case.
the medicated feed won't get rid of an outbreak..just helps keep them from getting it..but doesn't always work.

roo wouldn't cause the blood from vent..

could she be laying?
could she have worms?

 

[Tootsie]

As I said Sunday it was all blood and blood clots like a period would be.

This morning it was a lot better one has a little green stuff in it, some poop almost free of blood, others have more:

and another shot:

Now this afternoon seems a little better. Don't have time for that pic right now but no blood noticeable on white papertowel.

Well I can worm her this afternoon with ivermectin. Do you think it is worms or what?

What does this look like? Thanks.

 

[threehorses]

Although she may have worms, what you're seeing isn't a symptom of them.

There are three parts of bird droppings and we'll examine them.

First, there are the urates - the solid white section. These are the crystalized products of protein metabolism of the bird. They come from the kidneys. Birds aren't set up to have a mammal-like bladder because the weight of holding normal urine would inhibit flying. (Everything in even flightless birds is designed for flight.) So they produce lighter urates.

Your birds' urates appear to be well formed and solid white, not tinged with the pink of the droppings.

The second part of the droppings are the actual feces. This is the worm-like solid section of the droppings. It's hard to tell without being able to stir them about, but it doesn't look like the blood is quite in the feces. Is it? or is it separate?

The third part of the dropping is the "urine" part. This is the clear part that isn't urates and isn't droppings. Birds don't urinate like mammals, but there is some clearish part of their droppings that also comes from the kidneys. In the case of your bird, the entire urine looks to be tinged with pink of the blood.

Is it because it was in contact with the clots? Or is there blood from the kidneys? It's hard to tell. But in the second picture there are no large clots (although I might see a small bit of clot on the right hand dropping) and the urine is still tinged pink. Because we can't for sure tell, we can't for sure rule out kidney damage or issues.

I'd suspect highly that because of the recent attack that she had some sort of internal damage. You say that the blood clots are decreasing. And apparently the pink tinge is, too. Because of that, I'd just continue supportive nutrition and make sure she drinks. I wouldn't put anything in the water to cause the kidneys to work harder until their involvement is ruled out. Just pure water. I am not sure that I personally would use Sulmet or Corrid despite the blood. Instead, I'd use probiotics to shore up her digestive tract. However, I'm not sure I'd use yogurt because of the possibility of intestinal irritation. I'd use acidophilus tablets/capsules, or a prepared livestock probiotic like Probios from the feedstore. You can even get small tubes of probiotics in the health section of Petsmart and Petco (just check the date to make sure they're not expired). Or you can give them a little parrot baby starter, also from Petsmart and Petco. It contains live bacteria and nutrients in balance. Kept refrigerated, it lasts a while. Just make sure whatever form of probiotic she gets, she gets one that is low-dairy i.e. not yogurt at this point.

I'd also not use my usual recommendation of applesauce. I'd only feed her very mild foods. Egg yolks, her crumbles, perhaps the parrotbaby food if that's what you choose - but then only about 1 teaspoon prepared. I wouldn't use solid foods like grains or breads.

Otherwise, I think her progress speaks of good news. I highly suspect this was something that will pass and that she's healing.

On worming, I'd wait at least two weeks to make sure she's over this. Worming is stressful to the digestive system, even though it is necessary in cases of worms. But wormy birds more usually present with frothy green droppings. The droppings, if they didn't have the blood tinged urine and clots, are beautiful. Well, for poop.

If the blood comes back, or mixes at all with the droppings, then I'd consider Sulmet because of its dual-action against both cocci and E. coli, which can cause bleeding due to irritation of the intestines. But I don't "feel" E. coli especially because of that recent attack. Then again, just treating with the more gentle Corid might not hurt. I absolutely cringe and not immediately saying "treat for cocci" when there's blood in the droppings. But this doesn't look much like cocci to me.

And then again, I can't rule out intestinal sloughing either. Or sloughing of the blood (it's clotted, not flowing) from some injury or something higher up in the tract.

 

[Tootsie]

What an awesome answer! You are the best! I will post a new pic tomorrow or email one to you. I sincerely appreciate your help very much!

I didn't see the males try and jump her but they probably did that or pushed her around or perhaps you are referring to the fox but there is no exterior blood or marks on her at all. Sure she was traumatized though. The 2 smaller pullets I rescued from there along with her are only 11 weeks old and are in there too but they are very quick so I don;t think anyone messed with them.

 

[threehorses]

That's what's so confusing about this - you didn't mention external injuries, but this presumably wasn't happening before. And it just doesn't look like normal coccidiosis if it is cocci.

It's just tricky.

 

[Tootsie]

Now here is a weird thought which probably has nothing to do with it since chickens don;t mestruate but when I was in my 20's if I had high emotional stress with something highly upsetting happen to me I would start bleeding really heavy, I guess that couldn't happen to a chicken huh?

I am emailing you the poop on the paper towels when I went in this morning.

 

[ChooksChick]

I want to ask this because I don't want to repeat incorrect info- isn't cocci supposed to be no longer a threat by a certain age?

What I mean is, isn't there an age at which one no longer considers it as a possible culprit? My understanding is that they no longer show symptoms and have developed immunity by 8 weeks...but I could certainly be wrong.