Gapeworm? OR is this something else??? Please HELP!

[HENrietta's House]

UPDATE:
Starting to wonder if this is gapeworm... After dosing 4x with fenbendazole (paste on bread), symptoms appear better, but they are still there!!! Could this be something else? Predominant symptoms are now sneezing/coughing and head shaking. Still no discharge. Normal poop. Assuming it is gapeworm, should we try something other than fenbendazole? Should be increase the amount or frequency of dosing? Please help!!! We want our poor RIR to feel better (our BA seems cured), and we want eggs for breakfast! Thank you!!!

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After much research (both here and other online sources), we're quite sure two of our hens (black aust. and RIR) have gapeworm. (Gurgly sounds, sneezing, head shaking, stretching necks, and I saw what I think was a gapeworm in their poop, which otherwise seems normal) They had pretty much stopped laying, but now have started up again, but not as much. Also, we read that it can be caused by eating earthworms, which we fed them as treats, thinking we were being good to them! They are just over a year old (we think, we were given the hens about 2 months ago from someone who could no longer keep them in the city).

We read about treating them with Safeguard (fenbendazole). We have tried, but are unsure if we got the dosing right -- they seem to be better, but not cured. Here's what we did...

We put a BB-sized dab of fenbendazole paste on a small piece of bread and gave it to the hens. Is it okay to give it with food? Will that work? We repeated this after about a week, after only seeing mild improvement.

Then, we read that they should be dosed multiple times, so we tried it again (2 more times over about 3 days).

We've also been giving them a probiotic mash (layer pellets with milkk, yogurt, and vit E), feeding their own eggs back to them (hardboiled and mashed up with shells) since we can't eat them, and giving them cayenne pepper.

They seem to be better, but not yet 100%. What should we do next???

Thanks so much!

 

[NotTheMomma]

http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/PS044

Does anything in that link sound familiar to what symptoms you are seeing? Gape worm is actually quite rare, and for you to have two with it, I"m wondering if something else could be going on.

BTW, you say you saw worms in the poop? Could you describe the worm? Typically those you see in the poop with either be round worms (look similar to spaghetti) or segments from tape worms (similar to grains of rice that is moving).

Are they losing weight? Appetite good? If you pick one up, can you feel the keel (breast bone) sticking out, and sharp? Do they have access to a run? Are they out in the yard, scratching and eating what they want? Do they have grit if they aren't out in the yard? What are you feeding them? How does their poop look?

Umm, I'm sure there's more questions, but I'm drawing a blank right now.

 

[NotTheMomma]

Fenbendazole at 20 mg/kg for 3-4 days is effective for removing gapeworms in pheasants. Tetramisole at 3.6 mg/kg for 3 consecutive days in the drinking water removes gapeworms. Poultry treated while larvae are migrating in the body develop immunity to gapeworms, even though therapy may abort larval migration. Levamisole fed at a level of 40 ppm for 2 days or at 2 g/gal. drinking water for 1 day each month has proved to be an effective control in game birds. Mebendazole fed prophylactically at 64 ppm or curatively at 125 ppm is effective in turkey poults. Cambendazole provided control when given in 3 treatments of 50 mg/kg for chickens and 20 mg/kg for turkeys.

http://www.merckvetmanual.com/mvm/index.jsp?cfile=htm/bc/202800.htm&word=gapeworm

Hope that helps

 

[HENrietta's House]

Thank you! I read through the link, but none of the descriptions seem as close as the gapeworm. They don't have any discharge from eyes or noses, which seems to be a common symptom of most of the respiratory diseases. They do close their eyes often, which I also read was a symptom of gapeworm. I had trouble believing it was that, too, but it seems the closest we've come upon. Then when I found the worm...

It was a stringy, stretchy, very thin, reddish worm in their poop. (Now I wish I'd looked at it under the microscope!) It wasn't obvious until I started dissecting the poop with a stick. (Believe me, I never thought I'd do that in my lifetime!) Later that night, I saw the gapeworm photo in the Merck vet manual and it looked like what I saw in the poop. I haven't been able to find another one...

Their poop seems to be "normal" -- maybe a little soft, but still looks like it fits in the normal classification based on the pictures I found on a page of normal poop here.

They seem to have good appetites and I don't think they are losing weight. They free-range most of the day in the yard/woods. They do have access to the compost pile, too. At night, they are in a coop with a 4x8 run with a 4x4 hen house. If we're not home and can't free range them, we connect a 2nd 4x8 run to the coop. They do have a dish of grit in the coop, as well as plenty of rocks/gravel in the woods. We feed them Layena pellets and they do a good job on the weeds in the yard, too. They also get plenty of healthy table scraps...

Maybe we should try the fenbendazole (would like to use that since we already have it) for 3-4 days in a row and see if it works. Has anyone dealt with this before and found a tried-and-true treatment? Thanks!

 

[HENrietta's House]

I will check the keel tomorrow... What would that indicate?

 

[HBuehler]

We have had 2 this year with them...Ivermectin is what I used.One was nearly dead from them..had just got her and within hours she was back to her spunky chicken self.
There are many forms of Ivermectin out there but I have horses so I used the instructions I found on the internet for the horse paste which was a "BB" sized dollop in about 2T of water and stir like crazy.Then 5-6 drops to the chicken. However if she's laying you can't eat the eggs but I figured if she was dead I couldn't either
It is recommended to re-worm in 21 days to really kill out the worms.
Some areas including where I live are seeing an increase in gapeworms this year my guess is the nice wet spring really increased the population of yummy bad treats for chickens.

 

[NotTheMomma]

I was reading that snails, slugs, darken beetles, and earthworms can all contribute to gapeworms.

You know what ya saw better than I do! I wasn't even there.

A word of caution with the tube wormers. Each BB size dose, or 1/4'' ribbon of wormer may NOT be the same dosage with each squirt. Meaning, the wormer will separate within the tube, so the first dose might be weaker/stronger than the next dose, etc. With a horse it doesn't matter because you're giving either the whole tube, or pretty close to it. Using it for other animals though, you might have to gauge the success or lack of, and see whether you'll have to redose. Not a huge problem, but something to be aware of. And yes I use my horse's wormer on the dogs as well.

Another thing, if you have a vet nearby, call the office and see if someone will do a fecal for you. Just gather some poop from different FRESH piles of poop, put in a plastic container or plastic baggie. If the poop has dried, it's harder to find the worms in the fecal. Or it was when I tried finding them, LOL! If you have a working relationship with the vet, some of the techs will do it for free, some may charge a small amount for it, and yet, some may refuse to do it because they don't treat chickens. Doesn't hurt to call and ask though.

I've been on the lookout for a microscope at yard sales, thrift stores, etc. Want one powerful enough to see the worms or eggs, but not necessarily a professional one. Once you learn how to do a fecal, and what you're looking for, it's really not that hard to do, and would save lots of money, as well as headache when trying to figure out what is wrong with an animal. And as you can see by my siggy, we've got lots of animals to worry about.

 

[HENrietta's House]

Dosed with fenbendazole (bb sized dab on bread) several times (days 1, 8, 10, 14/yesterday). We have seen much improvement, but not completely gone...

Should we dose them again? How often to completely get rid of the gapeworm? Should we try dosing with something else? (Also using cayenne pepper mash.)

We're just not sure what else to do, and are anxious to get these 2 hens better and start eating eggs again!

Thank you!!!

 

[HENrietta's House]

Update at beginning of thread... We just don't know what to do?!?!?!

 

[Jill777]

Is this a gapeworm? Anybody ever seen one on a q tip?