Eyes swollen and runny, act tired, then die. Lost over two dozen chickens in a week. Ideas?

[crperdue]

I have about 200 chickens in several different flocks. Some are in small breeding flocks of 10 hens and a rooster, and then a flock of about 90 hens and 10 roosters in a pastured hoop house that is moved to fresh grass every day.

The hens in the pasture had been laying about a month when they began showing signs of illness. Some of them acted tired and just sat around eating very little. Some of those had watery eyes, some swelling around one or both eyes, and there was some sneezing. Some of the affected birds recover but some just lay down and die. Egg production in the pastured pen dropped from around 65 a day to about 6 a day.

The pastured hoop house is about 100 yards from the breeder pens, but the illness spread over there anyway. Otherwise healthy adult birds seem sick for about a day then either die or recover. About half to a third of the sick birds die.

The only thing I had on hand was Corrid, but that didn't seem to have any effect at all. I was going to just let this run it's course and continue on with birds that had natural immunity, but yesterday I lost my only midget white turkey hen and I'd really like to at least know what this is.

Anybody know what this might be?

 

[bargain]

I would suggest contacting the Poultry Inspection office for your state and ask them if they could do an onsite inspection of the poultry or if you should bring some of the cadavers to them. I wouldn't want to second guess what it might it might be crd, ILT or MG.

You would really need to know some specific answers as to what it might be. I cannot guess and you would need to definitely know what it is with the size of your flock and whether or not you should do some more culling.... But you need professional assistance asap. Please message me if you are having any trouble finding your poultry inspection team, it is usually under the department of agriculture for your state. Best of wishes. farmer Nancy

 

[Leslieb118]

I agree with Farmer Nancy. If you can, if you lose another chicken, double bag it and put it in the refrigerator. Your state veterinary lab will often do necropsies for free. You need to find out what is killing them ASAP. Two dozen chickens is a lot to lose over the course of a week. Treating a flock that size when you don't know what you're dealing with would be a huge undertaking. Good luck and keep us posted

 

[bargain]

Here's some contact info for NC:
http://www.ncagr.gov/vet/animalhealthfactsheets.htm

NCDA&CS Veterinary Division, Dr. David Marshall, DVM, State Veterinarian
Mailing Address:1030 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC 27699-1030
Physical Address: 2 W. Edenton Street, Raleigh, NC 27601
Phone: (919) 733-7601; FAX: (919) 733-2277

Hope this helps! Nancy

 

[ivan3]

The rapid course, between onset and death/recover and the high mortality rate is very troubling. If I had 200 chickens and this sort of disease burning through the flock I'd have one of those that have succumbed in for an immediate necroscopy (call state vet./dept. of Ag. field office/local vet, etc. to see where/who to get the carcass to).

List of diseases: http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/ps044

What symptoms did the midget turk show before death - did head look something like this: http://www.merckvetmanual.com/mvm/index.jsp?cfile=htm/bc/203402.htm ?

You really need to get a bird in for a complete necroscopy/lab.

 

[1muttsfan]

you may be able to find a local vet who can do throat swabs if the above are not possible for you. Sounds alarmingly like Mycoplasma infection, but you should find out to be sure.