Frostbit Toes

[lauranickerson]

I'm so sick of the cold weather! My handsome Sussex rooster already lost half of his comb to frostbite, and now my little Sebright rooster has his comb and toes affected by frostbite. He was very sleepy and stumbling this morning. He didn't come out of the coop to eat when I let everyone out, and when I went to check on him, he had droopy wings, sleepy eyes, and was hardly walking because his feet probably hurt so bad. I could almost hear a sign of relief from him when I picked him up and he immediately fell asleep in my hand.

I brought him inside the garage and took this video.

I then took him into the heated garage bathroom and filled an ice cream bucket with about a cm of luke warm water, and after about a minute of his feet being in it, he was more alert, was able to keep his eyes open for more that just 5 seconds, and even jumped out of the bucket (not very well, but he did.) I then filled it again with warmer water and put him in again. He actually just laid right in the water and fell asleep because they warm must have felt so good.

When I pulled him out, I put him on a towel on my lap, and he cuddled right up next to me and fell asleep again. I dried him off a bit, then put triple antibiotic ointment on his feet, then put him in a box with mashed pellets and water and covered the box with a towel, to keep any of his heat in there with him. Again, he's still in my garage bathroom, which is about 65-70 degrees.


Does anyone have any other suggestions? I feel like I post on here too much, but I could really use all the help I could get, since I'm just about to round off my first year of chicken raising, so I'm still quite a novice.

Any help would be more than appreciated. Thank you.

 

[lauranickerson]

Things have turned much worse! Went to go check on him before I went to town and now he's not conscious! His eyes are open with very dilated pupils, and I barely poked his eyeball and he didn't flinch or blink or anything. We was on his side when I found him. I honestly thought he was dead, but I picked him up and I could still tell there was life in him. Then he had a seizure in my hand.

I don't think this was frostbite causing this. He has it, yeah, but this is just too weird. I had another Sebright I got along with him do almost this exact thing on Christmas morning, but he didn't make it through the day.

Please help! If not for him, then for the rest of my flock! Please!

Here's a couple more videos.

 

[CMV]

He is dying. He is probably already dead at this point. I am going to go through your history and try to piece together what you have been seeing. I'll be back.

 

[CMV]

You have CRD in your flock judging by some of your older posts. Did you ever send any birds in for necropsy? If not, I would recommend you do so. Your whole flock is likely to be infected. I am sorry. The only way to eradicate CRD is to destroy the whole flock. Any birds that are not actively ill are still carriers of the disease and will keep perpetuating it as long as they are alive.

 

[casportpony]

Sorry for your loss... Like CMV said, having a necropsy done is a good idea.

-Kathy

 

[casportpony]

Next time you have one that's sick, put it in an 80-85 degree room, then hydrate and do not bathe.

-Kathy

 

[lauranickerson]

That is so depressing. I will try to scrounge the money for the necropsy because if love to know for sure. I did a little reading, and you don't have to cull them, but you're right, they could always be carriers. I don't think I could cull them. I even love a few as much as you'd love a dog.
I have a couple questions for anyone that knows about CRD:

Can ducks have it? And can they pass it to chickens and vise versa?

I was planning on buying chicks tomorrow from Tractor Supply. They will be in a brooder in the garage for a while, but is there anyway to vaccinate them at home to protect them for when I indroduce them? I also have a duck in the garage in my makeshift hospital cage because he got attacked. Do you think he's a carrier that would infect my chicks in the same garage?

 

[CMV]

Please do not get any more birds at this point. They will become infected if they are in any contact- both direct and indirect- with the flock you currently have. Ducks can also carry most of the CRDs although they do not often actually get sick from them. That means that they can still infect other birds even though they show no signs of illness themselves.

There are vaccines available, but you need to know what they are infected with first. This is why a necropsy and/or testing of the flock is so important. Please consider this before bringing in any more poultry.