Dying ducks and maggots in their vent

[sj3364]

I had this happen to a rabbit. In addition to eating their flesh, they cause toxicity in the animal. The rabbit had been sick and we were trying to keep it cool in a cage in the basement and keep it clean because it had diarrhea. One day it was biting at its legs and I looked under it and there were maggots everywhere. We rushed it to the vet and they cleaned all the maggots and her wounds but she never recovered and we lost her a few days later.

Sad and very disturbing to see.

Sorry for your loss.

 

[drleo80]

Actually what we have here is a case of Duck Botulism.This disease is caused the toxins produced by Colstridium botulinum Type C....the spores of this bacteria is normally present in lakes and bonds bottoms..they thrive in hot dry summer days.
what happens that the duck ingests the toxin from the environment, and this toxin simply poisons their nervous system. you will see in the begining that they are unable to fly, may develop green diarrhea, later they develop paralysis of the legs then the neck, as you may see that they lose control on the neck, then they usually die due to respiratory failure or may drown because they can't hold their neck up.
Maggots are usually seen in a dead carcass feeding on the dead tissue, the toxin exists in the live maggots that fed on the dead poisoned carcass, other duck might ingest those maggots and get poisoned by the toxin.
you need to contact your local Veterinarian to discuss the use of anti-toxin and set up some control measures to get rid of this disease.

 

[drleo80]

Actually what we have here is a case of Duck Botulism.This disease is caused the toxins produced by Colstridium botulinum Type C....the spores of this bacteria is normally present in lakes and bonds bottoms..they thrive in hot dry summer days.
what happens that the duck ingests the toxin from the environment, and this toxin simply poisons their nervous system. you will see in the begining that they are unable to fly, may develop green diarrhea, later they develop paralysis of the legs then the neck, as you may see that they lose control on the neck, then they usually die due to respiratory failure or may drown because they can't hold their neck up.
Maggots are usually seen in a dead carcass feeding on the dead tissue, the toxin exists in the live maggots that fed on the dead poisoned carcass, other duck might ingest those maggots and get poisoned by the toxin.
you need to contact your local Veterinarian to discuss the use of anti-toxin and set up some control measures to get rid of this disease.

 

[Tahai]

This does sound like fly strike to me, as well. I raise angora rabbits, and fly strike is of major concern, so I'm fairly familiar with it.

With that many ducks, and all of them free-ranging, I'm guessing you don't examine them closely on a regular basis (not placing blame or fault, just stating a reality of farming). Is it possible these two ducks had minor prolapses as some point in the recent past, even if only for a few hours? The exposed skin would be exactly the type of environment flies look for to lay eggs. If the Cloaca then inverted back into the body fully, it would pull the fly eggs up into the duck's body.

I just did a google search on 'flystrike poultry' and came up with several hits.

Best wishes.