Help for Infected Feathers? (See pics)

[BlackberryFarm]

Hello all.

I am in need of a little advice. We have been keeping chickens a year now, and this is a new issue to my experience.

We have a 5 month old salmon faverolle rooster that is walking a little funny today. Not quite a limp, but definitely not normal.

So, we brought him in after dark and washed of the feet really well. We found some of his feather shanks bright red and inflamed. My question is this. Do chickens get infected feathers? If that is the case, what would I do about it? And what causes it?

They sure look infected to me, but I would like the input of some of the more experienced folks on the forum to chime in with their 2 cents.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Sorry about the lighting. The flash on my camera washed out the red a lot and I wanted a true color, so it's natural lighting.

 

[BrattishTaz]

I am definately not an expert but I have seen "angry" feather shafts on my birds a time or two. It has always resolved itself without treatment. If your bird is limping, perhaps you could try soaking his feet in warm water with epsom salt for a few minutes a couple of times a day for a day or so. I would use a hairdryer to completely dry the feathers afterward.

My plan B (after a couple of days soaking and keeping it dry) would be to try topical neosporin or polysporin.

Hopefully it is just irritated due to moisture. Antibiotics may be needed if it turns out to be a deeper infection.

 

[buffbeauty]

I have faverolles as well and have also had some "angry" looking areas like you have pictured, but have never had tehm cause any probles, limping, etc. Sorry

 

[Ksane]

They certainly look infected, don't they? My daughter has a mixed breed rooster who has a few leg feathers that seem to drive him nuts and he keeps pulling the same few out when they grow in. It looks red and irritated like that. Could your guy have walked on any kind of irritant, perhaps? I'm assuming you've looked all through his feathers and skin for mites or other critters? Mites are tiny and hard to miss if you haven't seen them before. Once you've seen them you won't miss them again.

 

[dawg53]

Here's a thread that you might want to read through:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=4148428

 

[BlackberryFarm]

Thanks everyone for the input. This is surely something new to me!

I looked for mites or other bugs and found nothing. None of the other birds has anything like this going on, either. Our weather has been dry for the last 10 days, no rain for at least that long, so no wet feet. We clean the coop floor every 2-3 weeks. We have poop boxes on a shelf under the roosts and those get cleaned 2 times a week. We sprinkle DE in the run to try to keep it in good shape.

I think we will try to soak his feet for the next few days with either epsom salts or weak betadine water and see if we can get him some relief. He is still living well, eating & drinking, he's just walking a little funny.

Hopefully we won't have it as bad as in the post you sent Dawg53! Those pics are awful! So far, we don't have any broken feathers, so maybe it's something different. I hope, I hope!

If anyone has any thoughts at all, please post. I appreciate your time so much!

 

[Nikkijo]

I think my problem stemmed from bumble foot . The feathers stayed inflamed after I got rid of the black spot. I treated the black spot and feathers as I wrote below. Every couple days I washed his feet good Then soaked them in warm water w/ a little bleach, blow dried completely then Covered red areas with either vetericyn or antibiotic ointment and folded up some gauze for padding and wrapped with vet tape ., This link may also be helpful for anyone having these issues : https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/cochin-foot-problem-help.1014713/post-17454519