Help! Cleaning waterers and feeders after they've been used with...

[ThePolishPrincess]

...sick chickens and antibiotics. (Read below for more!)

Hello, everyone. Got a VERY important question for you all today.

Our pet roo was the first to go after 2 years of having poultry. He aquired a nasty Respiratory Infection and he needed to be kept away from the others, so we took him into the basement and kept him in a large dog crate. We supplied him with a chick waterer and a feeder, too. The next day we went to TSC and bought Terramycin (powdered) to add to his water. This was done for over 3 weeks. What happened after was totally my fault. I kept a feeding cup in his cage and found him the next day, dead, with his head shoved in the cup. Not a fun sight, I felt very bad.

So, anyway, I grieved for a few days after burrying him and then faced the facts that I had to go clean up the area. I used bleach to try and clean up the antibiotics AND sick bird germs. I didn't do a great job of cleaning the dog crate, as I would have had to go over every little detail and bit of caging, but a did a pretty good job on the waterer and feeder.

We've decided to order 8 chicks for MPC this spring and keep them in the same general area that we kept my roo in. NOT in the same cage (just with the same waterer and feeder). We also want to show birds at a local fair in June, so we'll need the use of that crate eventually.

My question: When we set up the brooder for our new young ones, and use the same feeder and waterer, should I be concerned of them getting the illness? The same thing with the Terramycin. The bag didn't say it was safe for the use of chicks, so I'm just making sure. I don't know if I did a good enough job of bleaching everything. Is it possible to over-bleach? I've been letting everything stay just where I left it after cleaning, so nothing has been in contact with it.

I'm in a bit of a pickle here. I need to make sure everything is okay for my little ones in February, so if any of you have any doubt, speak up now or forever feel the might of your own guilt! Just another one of you mother hens over here!

P.S.-The bleach was watered down, if any of you are wondering.

Thanks!

 

[Wynette]

Bleach water should have killed most anything...if you want to be "ultra" sure, get some Oxine. It's a concentrate, and you mix it with water. I purchased a 4-quart pump-up sprayer from Home Depot for using the Oxine solution, and you can spray it on anything - including chickens!! It actually even kills the Marek's virus, I'm told.

What I've typically done in the past with feeders and waterers that have had medicine in them is to run the feeders and waterers through my dishwasher. I figure, the water gets much hotter in there than I could tolerate, and it MUST kill some of the germs. Then, I wipe them down after they dry with some Lysol wipes. THEN, when they are dry, I spray them with Oxine solution. I haven't had any further issues doing this.

Just as a side note, Terramycin is the wrong antibioitic for a respiratory illness; it's a very general, broad spectrum antibiotic. If you should have future respiratory illnesses, do a search on here...something like Auremycin, Gallimycin, or Tylan may have helped you more. Good luck!!

 

[mamabird]

Dishwashers sometimes have a sanitize cycle - if you could run items through this cycle, it should kill whatever. I know that in the food service business - if you don't have a dishwasher - you wash pots, plates, and so - in hot soapy water, then rinse, then put the items in bleach water to sanitize/sterilize. I usually use 1 capfull of bleach to 1 gal. of water. If you let items sit in the bleach water for 5-10 minutes, it should kill any bad stuff that might be remaining. You need to imerse the items, not just swish water around. I wouldn't worry too much about 'bugs' if you use bleach.... Good luck!

 

[ThePolishPrincess]

Thanks for the responces! I'll keep a tab on everything here.


Wynette, he was getting better after a few days, but when I thought he was completely restored and ready to go back to work in the flock, he started getting sick again. I was told I took him off too early and put him back on, increasing his intake. I posted on the BYC shortly after my roo's death, and was told the bacteria most likely got stronger and built up an immunity (sp?) to the antibiotics.

We knew something wasn't right when we got the stuff, but it was the only thing they carried in the way of 'illness treaters'. I had decided to purchace better formulas online, Tylan being one of them, but he started to get better, than we tried again, and soon after that he got his head stuck. Some of the reason I had to ask was because I used SO MUCH of that Terramycin. Yikes! The last thing I eally need is to kill another bird.

When I hatched two chicks in the spring last year, I had to buy hem starter and the store told us to buy Terramycin and give it to them in their water. I looked at the stuff and read the label, and thought it was rediculous! They were just new-born chicks, not sick at all! Healthy, in fact! It's sad how the store didn't really even know what they were doing, or so we think. (?)