fowl pox with secondary swollen and foamy eye

[Eggcessive]

It's odd that the injectable Tylan was too expensive because Tylan 50 usually costs around $14 for a vial, then you would need several syringes and needles. It can be given orally as well as the preferred method by injection. Tylan Powder for putting in water is very expensive at about $55 or so. The pox infection itself is a virus that won't respond to antibiotics, but any bacterial infections should respond. Your vet could write you a prescription for something stronger. Enrofloxacin is similar to Baytril. Sulmet which most feed stores carry is a sulfa drug that treats coryza which can cause the bad odor and eye swelling. Without a culture, it's guesswork on what it is. Be sure and get some probiotics for her to help the good bacteria in her intestines. Here is a link for Tylan 50 to show you the price: http://www.valleyvet.com/ct_detail....an 50|pmt|e|&gclid=CPnA45qL-8ECFRAF7AodoloAIw

 

[LutzFLdawg]

Well, good news this morning. The hen was acting much more lively this morning, and I even saw her eating from the food containers and drinking from the waterer. When I caught her to give her dose of antibiotics, her crop still felt empty so I tube fed her a half dose of hand feed to jump start her for the day. Her eye is still puffy (which I'm guessing may be from the pox sores around it), but the foamy discharge was half of what it was over the last couple of days.

I don't think it's coryza, we had a hen with that last year, and this hen doesn't have the smell coming out of her mouth, and the smell has gone down significantly since starting the oxytetracycline.

 

[LutzFLdawg]

Well, she's still got a foamy eye, and the swelling looks like it's not going down anymore. The foam is back to relatively odorless and white, instead of the yellow and stinky it was a few days ago. Is it time to switch antibiotics?

She's still getting tube fed as her crop is empty when I check on her in the mornings, while the rest of the ladies have nice plump and somewhat firm crops. So how long do I tube feed her? Her activity level matches the other chickens, but she isn't really pecking at the feeders or waterers. She barely even touched the mealworms I offered the flock, and didn't touch the scratch grain I throw out in the afternoons.

 

[LutzFLdawg]

OK, today is day 4 of Tylan 50, and the eye is still foamy. I stopped with the neosporin because as soon I put it on and let her go, she would scratch at her eye and even try to rub it on the ground (just like when they clean their beaks), and I figured that was doing more harm than good.

The fowl pox around her eye is holding steady, not really going away but not getting worse. She has a big spot on her comb, and the ones on her wattles are slightly bigger.

She still isn't eating on her own. Tube feeding is easy enough, but I'm going to try to ween her off the tube feeding this weekend. She does pick at treats when offered, but no where near as voraciously as her sisters.

I'm at my wits end here. I'm not sure what else to do, other than seeing if my vet will do a culture just so we know what we're dealing with.

Here's the eye yesterday:

 

[Eggcessive]

Sorry that she isn't a whole lot better after the Tylan. In a previous post you said that you had a hen last year with coryza. If there are any birds left on your property when you had that one, there are probably still possibly carriers of coryza in your flock. The coryza organism only last a few days in the environment, but if facilities are totally emptied of all poultry, there could still be coryza in the flock. The foam in her eye could be from all of the swelling from the pox, but a culture would be able to rule out a bacterial disease at least.

 

[LutzFLdawg]

The bird with coryza was culled long before this hen came to us. There's only one bird in common between the coryza bird and the current flock, and she's been in perfect health (other than looking pretty sorry right now because she's molting, but that's neither here nor there). I will talk with our vet about running a culture, I'm not sure what else to do other than just waiting and seeing.

really right now I'm more concerned about her not wanting to eat. How long would a bird typically need to be tube fed? She's acting normal (besides not laying), roaming around with the other hens, just not eating, which is why I was thinking about tapering off the tube to see if that would make her go back to the feeder and waterer.

 

[Eggcessive]

I haven't tube fed chickens before as I haven't dealt with much illness, but she may not be eating much since she is full from the tube feeding. I think you would be doing right to taper it off to see if she will eat. Maybe once her crop is empty, she will start to eat.

 

[LutzFLdawg]

OK, we got a preliminary report back from the eye drainage culture. They found:

E. coli
Pseudomonas aeruginosa
a Staph species (the report was not specific as to which one)

Her fowl pox is slowly clearing. When our vet examined her eye, he did see pox lesions on the inside of her lids, but also found the eye looks intact and uninjured, and expected her to regain function of the eye when the pox fully clears.

 

[Eggcessive]

Did the vet give you an eye ointment or drops for the different bacteria in the eye? She had an amazing array of both gram positive and gram negative bacteria in the eye. How long ago did the vet take the culture? Most take only 2 days to grow. Thanks for your update, and I hope she recovers without losing her sight in the eye.

 

[LutzFLdawg]

The vet took the culture Monday, the Lab received it Tuesday, and the prelim report came back this morning.

We're waiting on the final report before the next round of antibiotics, since the final report will have what antibiotics the various bacteria are sensitive to in it. From my quick Googling it look like gentamicin will take care the staph and the P. aeruginosa.