Chickens Don't Get Colds Like We Do.. Ailment Chart

[speckledhen]

This is mainly for the newbie chicken owners on BYC. After several posts regarding chickens with "head colds", I thought I needed to put up something for your benefit to help you diagnose these ailments. Sorry, Diana, not trying to steal your title or anything, and forgive me if you've already posted it somewhere, but this one is really easy to understand and I have it bookmarked myself.
Sneezing is one thing, because it can be brought on by dusty bedding or chemicals in their environment, but if you have a discharge from a chicken, you may have something serious. It's my understanding that chickens do not really get colds per se, they get diseases that most times make them carriers for life. That means that they may recover if you medicate them or maybe they'll recover if you don't, but they may shed the disease to other birds, even if they are asymtomatic. Now, it can be a sinus infection, and that would be better than Mycoplasma or Coryza, etc, certainly! Many manage their birds in such a way that if a bird gets bubbly eyes and discharge from the nares, they destroy it. This may seem extreme to some of you who think of your birds more as pets than as livestock, but it isn't really all that extreme, considering what you will read on the following chart. Now, I am not trying to start one of those posts where people get all up in arms being horrified at someone who would put down a bird for having a "little sniffle", I'm just trying to give you another tool to use in being an new chicken owner.
http://www.welphatchery.com/poultry_health.asp

 

[65browneyes]

Oh, thank you so much!! Very useful information in a perfect (for me, anyway) format. I put a shortcut on my desktop.

 

[merryreader]

That is a really big help. I'm not having any problems(except bald chickens), but it is easy information to understand. Merry

 

[dlhunicorn]

Sorry, Diana, not trying to steal your title or anything, and forgive me if you've already posted it

... dont be silly ... actually I have thought the same myself however as the MAYO clinic defines a "cold" as
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/common-cold/DS00056
..."A common cold is an infection of your upper respiratory tract. ..."

...and granted the causative organism of the respiratory infection in a bird will not be the same as in a human... but when one is refering to a respiratory infection in a bird ... then is it (according to this definition) so offbase to refer to it as a cold?yadda yadda... but I totally get what you are saying ... sneezing or a clear exudate from the nares is not necessarily a sign of an oncoming "cold" as it is in humans... in addition to the quite common occurance of sneezing due to ammonia or dry/dusty environment... vit A deficiency is also an often overlooked cause as well as untreated complicating factor :
http://216.109.125.130/search/cache...iciency+poultry&d=Ur9G1urnPAUp&icp=1&.intl=us
.."Vitamin AVitamin A is required for the normal function andperformance of various body tissues/organs including maintenance of mucous membranes,
cerebrospinal fluid pressure, growth of cartilage, growth and reproduction, vision and co-ordination...............The destruction of vitamin A by oxidation rancidity lead to acute deficiency symptoms including retardation of bone growth and suppression of endochondral tissue leading to ataxia. The latter is often confused with calcium deficiency. The other common signs of inadequate vitamin A are watery or milky discharge from the eyes and nostrils, sometimes leading to an accumulation of a ceseated material in the eye, blindness and the complete destruction of the eye ball..."

Here is a nice little short summary Respiratory disease of poultry:
http://www.nda.agric.za/docs/chicken/default.htm​

 

[speckledhen]

Another good summary-type link. Thanks, I've added that to my list as well.

 

[joanm]

Thank you Speckled Hen, I saved it to my favorites!