Chicken Loosing Toes

[KaOsFarm]

I ended up being gifted an older hen who had a significant amount of frostbite on her feet. I'm new to chickens and have luckily have not had any health issues besides with her. Her feet had started peeling for the last couple weeks revealing yellow skin. She was fine yesterday and this morning but when I got home one if her toes had fallen off and it looks like the others will too. She seems to be in a lot of pain and I'm not quite sure what my next steps for helping her are. What do I do next?

 

[chickengeorgeto]

I ended up being gifted an older hen who had a significant amount of frostbite on her feet. I'm new to chickens and have luckily have not had any health issues besides with her. Her feet had started peeling for the last couple weeks revealing yellow skin. She was fine yesterday and this morning but when I got home one if her toes had fallen off and it looks like the others will too. She seems to be in a lot of pain and I'm not quite sure what my next steps for helping her are. What do I do next?

The first thing that a new doctor is taught is to do no harm.

The same thing applies to chickens. Keep her in a quite, draft free, clean environment and she will either heal or else she will die. That is the long and short of it, sorry.

There is absolutely nothing you or anyone else can do other than completely amputating her entire foot or feet. From the pictures it looks to me that if you do nothing but support her while she heals that she will likely live. Sorry if you were looking for a miracle but that is the closest thing to a miracle that I can offer.

 

[Relleoms]

Perhaps add some aspirin to her drinking water to help with pain relief? Other than that, I think it’s best to let nature take its course.

 

[Kessel23]

I ended up being gifted an older hen who had a significant amount of frostbite on her feet. I'm new to chickens and have luckily have not had any health issues besides with her. Her feet had started peeling for the last couple weeks revealing yellow skin. She was fine yesterday and this morning but when I got home one if her toes had fallen off and it looks like the others will too. She seems to be in a lot of pain and I'm not quite sure what my next steps for helping her are. What do I do next?

Do what ChickenGeorgeto suggested, there is sadly no "miracle" cure for frostbite once they get it the damage is already done. To prevent frostbite on the toes and feet you must provide them with a very wide perch to roost on, mine is 3 inches wide and my chicken's feet sit flat on it. With the small perch shown in the picture the chickens toes hang over the edge, this can mess with the blood flow in the toes and cause frostbite in cold weather. Also, wide perches make it so the chicken can cover its whole foot, toes & all, when it sits down on the perch, this makes it so the foot is inside the chickens warm feathers when it sleeps. A skinny perch would make it so the dangling toes are exposed to the cold while the rest of the foot it safely tucked away in the feathers, this is why your chicken's toes frostbite comes to such a sudden and defined stop, that is the part of the foot that hangs off when the bird roosts. I live in Wisconsin, the only birds of mine that get frostbite are yearling roosters crowns, yearlings ducks feet, and Muscovy Caruncles.

 

[Farm life101]

Prosthetic feet for chickens!?