help! favorite hen has eye problem

[farmergal]

My favorite girl, Hope (who survived a fox attack and was nursed back to health with the help of BYCers) has a strange thing going on with her right eye. I noticed another bird pecking at it, and I'm worried if I don't fix it the flock is going to make it much worse.
The eye socket (where the skin meets the eyeball) is enlarged and there's a whitish thing (kind of looks bubbly) in the corner. Both eyelids seem to be working as far as I can tell.
Please help! She's the only chicken of my flock of 50 who's started laying, and she's my favorite even without her beautiful (almost daily) little blue green eggs...
Here's a pic of her normal left eye:

Now two shots of the right:

 

[brooster]

for now i would just seperate her and se if it heals.

good luck

 

[farmergal]

Would there be any ointment or eyewash solution that would be appropriate to use? should I take her to the vet? I wouldn't do that for most of my chickens but this girl is really special... she just started laying eggs 6 days ago and has given me 5 eggs in 6 days.... I'm wondering if maybe that's stressing her body out or something??

 

[greenfamilyfarms]

Looks like her tear duct is clogged or inflamed. She may have gotten something in it and it just made it swell up. Kind of like when you get sand in your eye and you rub it - it gets red and swollen. I would rinse it with fresh water, or saline solution if available, and then put some ointment approved for use in the eye in it. Good luck!

 

[farmergal]

Could it be an infection? I read another post that sometimes eye infections are related to bronchial infections... and that you can put neosporin/polysporin in the eye (despite the fact that the label says you can't)... anyone have experience with this??

 

[Poohbear]

Get some VetRX from the feed store and read the directions for using it in the nasal cavities. I think it may solve your problem.

 

[sammi]

wash the eye with saline eye wash.
try using a warm compress on the eye.
you can get terramycin eye ointment at most farm/feed stores.

separate her so the others don't peck her eye out.

here is some info about eye worm::

http://fowlfacts.proboards40.com/index.cgi?board=afflictiondiseaseff&action=display&thread=1253


for infected sinus and eye treatment:

http://happyhenhouse.proboards43.com/index.cgi?board=help&action=display&thread=6791

 

[farmergal]

wow, those links are really useful. I'll separate her from the rest of the flock first thing in the morning and head to the feed store for the ointment... I hope it doesn't look too much worse in the morning.

thanks for the advice! if anyone else has had a similar problem, I'd love to hear how fast your treatment worked... or what you did to try and solve it.

Hope thanks all of you too!! with just a topical antibiotic, I can still eat her eggs, right?

 

[sammi]

topicals shouldn't effect the eggs.

try that first..
if the eye gets worse, or she has more symptoms...then a systemic as mentioned in the link will be needed.

good luck.

 

[farmergal]

Thanks! She looks a lot better this afternoon... the difference between the 2 eyes is barely noticeable. And I was at work all day and only just brought home the topical eye ointment from the feed store, but I will apply it first thing in the morning just to clear up any residual problems.