I learned a very hard lesson...I neglected my best judgement and a fundamental rule of chicken keeping and added 3 new silkies I purchased at a fur and feather swap in Sept to my flock without quarantining them first. A week later I found one of the newbies dead under the roost. I didn't think much of it until I started finding lice on my birds, then last week found one of my otherwise healthy young frizzles dead. Several days later all heck started breaking loose when I discovered one of my Polish hens with swollen closed eyes and a foul smelling nasal discharge. Next day Polish hen #2 with the same symptoms...today, day 3, my two roos are gurgling and wheezing. I have had all birds on Terramycin for 3 days, but my friend got sulfadimethoxine from a vet today so I will switch to that tomorrow. I am off work tomorrow so my plan is to clean and disinfect the coop and everything in it, replace the bedding, etc. Before this all started I was just planning on dusting for the lice. Should I wait until the crisis is over to do this to avoid further stressing my birds? I have about 25 birds of various breeds including a few bantams. I am SOOOO MAD at myself over this and have not been getting much sleep!
