Help! Unknown peacock malaise despite de-worming and coccidiosis treatment

[MontserratChick]

Thank you so much for your help so far guys. I wonder if you could advise me a bit more. I stayed home today to be with him and he's looking so unwell. The vet told us to put the ronidazole in his water but I'm concerned that he's not drinking, and he looks so much worse today. So I took some of the ronidazole and laced pieces of tomato and some grapes, as he loves these. He ate some of both, so I know he got some down him, but now I'm a bit concerned I gave him too much!

The packet of the ronidazole, as far as I can tell, says to give 10mg per kg of body weight. Assuming he's around 5-6kg (11-13 pounds) I reckon the right amount should be around 60mg. Trouble is I have no way of measuring this because I don't have a sensitive enough scale and I can't find a conversion rate for teaspoons (the weight/mass thing really annoys me sometimes!)

From working on the basis of cornflour, I think I can work out that he needed one fifth of a teaspoon a day of the powder. I'm pretty sure I just gave him at least that (but probably not significantly more).

My questions are; do any of you have any rough idea of the dosage in teaspoons of powdered medication that says its composition is 'Ronidazole 75mg, Excipients 1g' (brand name trichorex - marketed at pigeons) and secondly, if you think I've given him enough of his daily dose, should I remove the medicated water and food and give him fresh stuff so that I don't over-dose him?

Thank you all. He looks so bad today. I'm waiting for my husband to call the vet to try to get some antibiotics to treat any possible secondary infection. I've confined him to the hayloft and will go and sit with him. Poor, poor boy.

 

[casportpony]

I have found that most powders 1 teaspoon weigh 2.7 to 3.3 grams. Does that help? You could also tube the medicated water. Shame on your vet for giving you medication for his water instead of oral. Once they get this sick they rarely survive, so if possible, I think you should get him back to the vet for some injectable Baytil, oral metronidazole, and subutaneous fluids. Would also be best to keep him in a warm room or cage... 80-85 degrees is ideal.

-Kathy

 

[MontserratChick]

Oh no - is it really so unlikely he will survive? I'm so sad. The vet has no baytil or its ingredient in another form. She's going to give me a broad antibiotic for dogs and I'll give him half a tablet. He's still walking and eating a little but I'll give him liquids with salt and sugar with a syringe. It's really warm out and he's in a quiet space so I may leave him there for now. Any more advice you have would be very gratefully received.

 

[MontserratChick]

Does he need metranidozole too? I don't think they have it :-(

 

[casportpony]

Does he need metranidozole too? I don't think they have it :-(

Are they a small or large animal vet? Most small animal vets here in the US use metronidazole to treat clostridium perfringens in dogs, so they will have tablets and/or suspension. Not sure it matters which one he gets, but the correct amount needs to be given orally, and he should also be treated for E. coli with injectable Baytril. Fluids will also really help him.

-Kathy

 

[MontserratChick]

I think it's just a countryside vet who does everything! There was a small dog in front of me in the queue this morning so definitely small animals. In my pretty bad French I tried to ask for metranidazole but she was adamant that the ronidazole was far more effective. She didn't have flagyl - or said something about it not being right - I can't be sure. But my husband had phoned before and explained the problem of secondary infection and she gave us a broad spectrum antibiotic for dogs. Each tablet has 50mg of trimethoprim and 250mg of sulfamethoxypyridazine - whatever that is in english. She said to give half a tablet once a day.

I gave him the tablet and then gave him a 20ml syringe of water with sugar, a little salt, cayenne pepper and a little more ronidazole.

On the plus side he was difficult to catch and fought me pretty hard, so he does seem to have some energy. But his poop is still just yellow froth. Really praying he survives. We lost our one and only peachick a couple of weeks ago (you were kind enough to console me on that one and it does look like he maybe had blackhead in retrospect), then last week we lost nearly all of our hand-reared Cream Legbars and Norfolk Greys, who we had transported 1,000 miles from the UK as eggs, hatched out and raised in the house, when a stone marten (fouie in French) killed 10 of them in one night, leaving them decapitated around the run. So we're having a really bad run of it if our beautiful peacock dies too. :-(

 

[casportpony]

Ronidazole might be more effective than metronidazole (Flagyl), so you might be okay there. The trimethoprim and sulfamethoxypyridazine is a good antibiotic, so if he does have E. coli that is sensitive to sulfa, then it could work, but the problem is some strains of E. coli are resistant to sulfas. Too bad you can't get someone to translate for you, because I'd want to ask them some pretty specific questions.

• Why oral sulfa instead of injectable Baytril or Amikacin?
• Exactly how much Ronidazole, as in how many mg and how many time per day?
• Why no subcutaneous fluids?
• Why no mention of tubing fluids/food?
• Why no mention of keeping him in a warm room?

-Kathy

 

[MontserratChick]

Hey Kathy and other lovely helpful people...

So I took your advice and brought him indoors to a disused bedroom. I just went upstairs to give him some more fluids before I go to bed, and he had done the most enormous poop. Instead of just a little bit of frothy yellow, this was loads of liquid - some clear, some yellow and a lot of white. There were two small solid bits in there too. Do you think this is a good sign?

 

[casportpony]

Hey Kathy and other lovely helpful people...

So I took your advice and brought him indoors to a disused bedroom. I just went upstairs to give him some more fluids before I go to bed, and he had done the most enormous poop. Instead of just a little bit of frothy yellow, this was loads of liquid - some clear, some yellow and a lot of white. There were two small solid bits in there too. Do you think this is a good sign?

Glad you were able to bring him in, I know many of mine would have died if I left them out in the cold. Less froth and less yellow is a good sign, but lots of white could be an indication that he needs more fluids. I can teach you to tube feed if you're up to it.

-Kathy

 

[MontserratChick]

Glad you were able to bring him in, I know many of mine would have died if I left them out in the cold. Less froth and less yellow is a good sign, but lots of white could be an indication that he needs more fluids. I can teach you to tube feed if you're up to it.

-Kathy

I can try! I've been giving him 10-20ml of sugary water at a time so far. It seemed like he had a lot of water in his stool. Is there something else I need to give him? Is it better to feed him through the night or let him rest?