Chick drinking water, but coming out of mouth when head is down!!!!

[Equine_Angel]

Hi,

Yet again, I am on another rescue mission from last night. I noticed one of my 2 months of leg-horn crosses was laying on her side under the heat lamp and getting trampled by the younger chicks. She was completely listless. Luckily she was still alive and I decided to bring her inside and keep her in our bathroom. I slowly fed her some probiotic yogurt and water and she started to take it. Within 10 minutes she started to have a little more life in her. I placed a bowl of water and food in with her and she was eating and drinking.

She has faired well overnight and is walking about in a large rubber drinking trough

I noticed that her poo was a little runny, but no sign of blood (which I am still worried about as we have had a few die from cocci).

When she was drinking her water this morning, I noticed that as she put her head down, the water started to come back up, but not at all times. Is there a blockage in her throat? She is chirping away, quietly and does not seem to be gasping for air. Some of the other chicks in the barn are having some coughing/wheezing fits. Is this a cold that they might have caught?

This has not been a good chick year for us and have lost many, which is unusual. Last year we had 50 chicks and they all lived. This year we got 65 and now we are down to 50.

 

[gallusdomesticus]

It sounds like she has a digestive obstruction. Water pouring out of her beak with her head lowered means her crop is full and is not passing fluid downstream. Check her crop for a mass in it. If her crop is clear, her obstruction is further downstream and, quite frankly, without surgery, nothing much can be done. I had this happen to a hen of mine who swallowed a couple of staples that lodged in her gut and she also had water pour out of her mouth when her head was lowered. I hope this isn't your case. If the obstruction is in her crop, there are a number of good threads on this board on how to get rid of the blockage. Good luck.

 

[kelar]

It sounds to me like she has cocci and her crop is not emptying because everything slows to a crawl when they are ill. The cocci makes them drink a lot so she probably just drank more water than her crop could hold. I would immediately treat all of them with Sulmet (2 tablespoons per gallon of water for 2 days then half that for 4 days), keep the sickest one isolated, warm and very clean. Make sure she is getting enough of the medicated water because of the crop slow down. Very gently massaging the crop will help, but don't do this when it is very full or she could aspirate. I had one like this just this week and finally pulled her through, but you will have to be diligent about it for a few days. When they are ill, they sometimes do not get enough of the medication to knock out the cocci.

 

[Equine_Angel]

Being up in Canada....we do not get Sulmet here. The vets have not even heard of the stuff. The vet will be calling me to see what I can treat the chickens with. For now she looks to be eating and drinking well. I have put some oil in her food and gave her a good massage, even though her crop does not feel impacted. She is skinny though. So far, I have not seen blood in her poop, but she has turned around, health-wise, in the last 12 hours.

 

[Equine_Angel]

Strike that....she is now having bloody droppings, but not occuring all the time. This was the first.

 

[kelar]

It may go by the name Albon up there. Not positive, but think they are the same or similar drugs. Something in the sulfonamide class of drugs should take care of it. Hopefully your vet can help you. Corid (amprol) is also used, but I don't find it as effective against some types of cocci. Have you checked in the livestock section of your feed store? Ours stocks sulmet in the cattle section. Also can look for sulfadimethoxine. They will turn around fast with treatment, but also go down very fast if the cocci overwhelms their systems.