HELP: Hen with pale comb/wattles acting unthrifty.

[casportpony]

She hasn't 'worsened' at all, she's acting just the same as yesterday. she's not droopy and looks 'unsuspecting' physically besides her pale comb and she doesn't seem to have eaten yet.

I have no experience with Blackhead but when i read about it it sounded much worse than what she's showing? We may have some Flagyl here but it's in human dosages... that stuff is Disgusting. I will call and ask the Vet to see if it's something I can get from him rather than buy online.

I have seen blackhead in my turkeys, peafowl and one chicken. They all start off looking "off"... not eating as much, droopy wings, fluffed up, pale. Some have had yellow in their droppings, others had bloody droppings.

Do you have the liquid form or pill form? Doesn't matter, you can make it work either way. Your vet will probably tell you that it's not common in chickens, but the pathologist that I spoke with said that they are seeing more of it in chickens.

Talking to your vet would be best... He can tell you what diseases Flagyl is used for and how to dose them. To treat blackhead, my avian vet told me to give 30mg/kg once a day my mouth for five days and to de-worm with Safeguard .5cc/kg (50mg/kg) once by mouth and repeat in ten days.

When I have treated mine, I usually see improvement in 2-3 days, if I have started treatment in time. The ones that I didn't treat soon enough also developed secondary systemic bacterial and fungal infections

 

[delisha]

Check her for a yeast infection too. Gleet is a possibility. Hard to tell with the pictures. I hope it is not blackhead. It is good you separated her.

 

[casportpony]

Copper sulfate will treat blackhead as well:
http://www.mcmurrayhatchery.com/acidified_copper_sulfate.html
The cecal worm carries the protozoa. Worm your birds after treating for blackhead.

My vet told me to use copper sulphate as a preventative.

 

[casportpony]

Worming with Piperazine afterwards would work fine then, right? Dels/Tractor Supply sells the acidified copper sulfate but only in 40# bags! Going to call a friend and see if she has any since she has goats and I am assuming that's why dels sells it in such a large bag.

You would need to worm with something that has fenbendazole (Safeguard or Panacur) or albendazole (Valbazen), piperazine only gets roundworms, it does not get cecal worms! You can get Safeguard for Goats at TSC.

 

[casportpony]

Check her for a yeast infection too. Gleet is a possibility. Hard to tell with the pictures. I hope it is not blackhead. It is good you separated her.

Yeast infections are common in birds with blackhead.

 

[casportpony]

This shows metronidazole doses, but it doesn't say what they are for.

 

[casportpony]

Bleenie, before you go buy a bunch of stuff, please talk to your vet. I only mentioned blackhead because of the one yellow poop picture that I saw. For all I know, there may be ofther reasons that her poop is yellow. De-worming her with Safeguard is a good idea, regardless of what she might have. Copper Sulphate won't hurt her either, but I cannot find a single veterinary reference that says to use just it and not metronidazole.

 

[Bleenie]

I am going to go out and get some more pictures of her... so you can "see what im seeing". she doesn't look sick besides the comb & poo... and of course she doesn't seem to be eating.

I recently had a lice problems that i treated with Ivomec on the back of each birds neck. then last night i did a bug inspection and trimmed all of the poopy butt fluff some of the birds had on them from the lice problem. I did not trim hers yet so i didn't have a chance to see if her vent looked normal or not.

it froze last night but besides being a little less active(from the cold) the rest of the flock all looks fine still.
Also, not sure if it's worth mentioning, but, my 2 calves that are housed next to the coop(chickens have access around their pen when free ranging) recently were treated with Sulmet for Cocci. cattle cocci isn't "catchable" by chickens but maybe she got into the old bedding with the poo that had sulmet in it? I'm trying to think of anything peculiar that's gone on lately!

I will be back shortly with pictures.

 

[casportpony]

The poop pictures in these links were from peachicks that had blackhead.

Warning, not family friendly!
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/714542/lightbox/

The poops on the paper towel are normal, but the rest responded to treatment for blackhead.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/719075/lightbox/

 

[Bleenie]

Here's the poo, it looks almost kind of greenish now? but there's still some "real" poo in it, but a very small amount.




And here's what I am seeing as far as her physical appearance. Her stance is healthy-looking and she's still got very good feather sheen. her comb may have reddened up a TINY bit but i have to recheck the last picture. she's still trying to escape every chance she gets. I can see where she poked around in her feed but her crop is empty. i couldn't see much of a difference in the water.