Doing all that is noted, still have frostbit comb tips?

[Wynette]

Another thing to consider: quite commonly, a rooster won't breed when his comb is frostbitten, so you'll have egg fertility issues. I had a roo last year that got the tips of his comb frostbitten, and it took MONTHS for the tips to finally fall off. I had to separate him, too, because the girls were pecking at the tips. It's not worth it, to me, to have to separate my roo for months, so I now slather them up!

 

[nikischicks]

My vents are my windows that are up high, rigged so they are not all the way open.
I will do the poop daily also from now on.
I dont have any roos so I dont have to worry about the breeding issue thank goodness.

 

[Mrs MIA]

Just to clarify, too... all of my roosters are indoors in the winter, and they still got frostbitten when it got down to 0F in the coop. The coop is insulated and ventilated, and they can handle it for short periods of time, but when it stays like that for days/weeks, they're going to get bitten unless you do something to protect them. Last year we had a teenager get badly frostbitten toes that got infected (turned green). I never saw him because he was always huddled underneath someone else. He's the only one I've had to put down because of the cold.

 

[Wildsky]

SOme of my birds got frostbite last year, but so far nothing this year and we've been getting really cold! (was -15 last night, with windchill of -29. Our high today was 9)

I didn't and haven't put anything on their combs, I think I tried it once last year.

Last year my girls with the big floppy combs got frostbite, I think the worst of it! This year their combs are MUCH shorter, and I've not seen a problem!

The whole vasaline thing will help if your coop is too moist and not enough ventilation. Its not going to keep the comb warm or anything like that. It will keep the moisture off the comb and the moisture then won't be able to freeze there and cause the frostbite problem.

There was a long thread here last year about it, folks testing it out to see if it really did help or not - I think they came to the conclusion that it didn't really help much at all.

 

[nikischicks]

wildsky, are they shorter cause you clipped them or the frostbit part came off?

 

[Wildsky]

Quote:
Frostbitten part must have fallen off - BUT I did not see that, and last year only a small part on top was frostbitten, this year they're MUCH shorter - perhaps they shrunk up a little bit or something, I don't know.

 

[Akane]

I had a roo last year that got the tips of his comb frostbitten, and it took MONTHS for the tips to finally fall off.

Which is why I just cut mine if it happens. They recover much faster and may be acting normal the next day. Some have said they will heal eventually but you won't know whether they will or not until months later which is months of pain and possibly not mating. If you cut the black parts off they improve within days and heal within weeks instead of months. Yes there are plenty of reasons to prevent frostbite if at all possible and it is uncomfortable but it's rarely life threatening. I do support dubbing if you have a situation and breed that you just can't prevent frostbite on and I may have to do it in the future. The blizzard these past few days had 96% humidity at 20-30F. I can't do much about coop humidity when that happens and tonight we are dropping straight from 30F to a range of -1 to -10 within the next 8hours. Frostbite is inevitable on large combed breeds that don't tuck their head while sleeping when weather like that goes through.​

 

[nikischicks]

Yeah, our weather does not seem to be helping much. It was raining all day yesterday then dropped like 40 degress and there was a dusting of snow this morning and a terrible wind chill. Im leaving them in today.
Do you have any tips on the dubbing? I have read a good page someone had linked here. I do have stiptic powder (sp?) for bleeding, I hope that there is not much though.

 

[JoAnn_WI_4-H_Mom]

Poor Sussex Roo this morning, his wattles were hard.

We have a heat lamp in the roost area, he chooses to sleep elsewhere.

And it is only Dec 10. We are going to have to struggle through this year, and the hubby wants to build a more insulated winter quarters for next year.

 

[Akane]

I've only had bantams frostbite and I only remove what's black so I just get a really sharp pair of titanium scissors like you can buy from any office supply store/section. Hold down the bird and *snip*. Try to do it in as few of cuts as possible but make sure you don't angle it wrong or let them wiggle so you cut too deep. On big standards you might need something a bit heavier duty. My gamebird shears or fishing shears would probably do it. They take the heads off quail easily enough (don't slip). This is the first roo I had frostbite:

I just cut from the front of his comb across the tips following the curve with the scissors and then cut off the back. He wiggled a little and that was it. I put him back in the pen with his 5 hens and he called them over to some treats. If you have hens that might peck or the roo might get it dirty you'll probably want to put something on the cut parts. The rest of the black went away within days after he'd spent months looking like the first picture and in a week you wouldn't know anything had happened except his hens had longer combs than he did. If you are doing black completely frostbit tissue there is little bleeding so long as you don't go far into the still red/pink tissue. The reason it turns black is from lack of blood flow. I haven't done preventive dubbing yet on a bird with an all healthy comb. You can't convince me it doesn't hurt which is why I don't agree with doing it for show standards or looks but if it proves our weather just results in some of my breeds like the japs frostbiting frequently no matter what I do I think it's better to dub than getting frostbit first and having it cut off anyway as full adults.