Chicks treated but still with bloody poop

[venessagold]

I have 8 chicks, all about 4-5 weeks old and one or more of them is pooping bloody poop. Pretty bloody. There don't seem to be any other symptoms at all as far as I can tell. I first noticed a bloody stool on Tuesday afternoon and now it is Thursday morning and I've seen a bunch more where they were sleeping overnight. Didn't see anything unusual yesterday.

They were treated with Amprol last week before being moved into a coop with some older hens in a friend's yard, and now I've got them home to my house into a brand new coop with no older hens, and when I asked her about it on Tuesday she said maybe it's just the medication working it's way through their system? Now I'm concerned though, since it's a bit more blood and I've never had any chicks with cocci before. (This is my 3rd round of chicks in 4 years.)

What to do? I'm gonna be keeping a close eye on them today, and if I can single out the chicks that are pooping blood I'm going to separate them somehow. I don't have a good way to do that unfortunately since we just changed our whole chicken living quarters around. I don't want to lose chicks! My kids would be devastated--after losing all our chickens over the winter to a raccoon this is our fresh start!

 

[DraigAthar]

What was the dosage and course of Amprol used?

 

[centrarchid]

If you are treating to control cocci, a sustained treatment regimen is needed for a few days. Treatment does not kill cocci outright, rather it suppresses cocci reproduction until bird's immune system can control it.

 

[venessagold]

Unfortunately I don't know the dose/course of Amprol offhand, though I could probably find out easily enough. I've been out observing them and they are all eating and drinking.

I do know that none of the chicks were showing symptoms before the treatment they received last week, just that it was a precautionary measure since they were going to be sharing a space with some older hens. I know that the treatment is just like, a booster, until their immune systems can handle it and not an outright treatment, so I figured they would be fine as none were symptomatic before. I guess I'll need to give them a bit more of it on a maintenance dose if they all survive this, just for a while?

I have read that adding a bit of powdered milk or other protein foods can help in the meantime, so I'm thinking I will put a bit of powdered milk in their feed and maybe also put out a bit of yogurt? I also have some sav-a-chick probiotics and also the electrolytes that I've had mixed up and was giving them the last 2 days, I can give them more of that if anybody thinks it will help.

 

[DraigAthar]

Pre-treating chickens with amprolium before they move to a new flock makes no sense. It's not a vaccine. If the treatment stops when they move to the new flock, the supression of cocci also stops. Yes, I think you ought to treat them with a proper course of the amprol at whatever strength is recommended for active infection.

 

[venessagold]

Ok Thanks! I'm not sure that they weren't having Amprol the whole time they were with the older hens, I just know they were getting it before I brought them home. The lady who raised them from birth until now has been keeping chickens a lot longer than I have so I'm sure she knows that, I just haven't had a chance to talk to her again to find out more info about what kind of treatment they got. I'll head out to pick up some meds this morning.

 

[DraigAthar]

Good luck with them!