Help with sick turkey baby.

[sharvc]

Friends, I have been searching the Internet for weeks for help. You are my last hope. I found a post about a duck that was fairly similar but not exactly. On September 11, I purchased 3 Bourbon Red Chicks. As they approached 2 weeks old, one began falling backwards and I thought maybe it had injured it's leg. I read everything o could find and tried to help, but soon noticed it wasn't actually the leg, it was balance. The little chick acted drunk and continued to grow worse. Then about a week later another one of the chicks started showing the same behavior. At this point I called the feed store who was gracious enough to call the hatchery. I administered antibiotics given by the feed store... Who thought maybe the chicks had got too cold because they had no problems and neither did the hatchery.
At that point the chick began having seizures and long story short, all three ended up sick and died. This was very hard! Now I've had two Royal Palm Chicks that are two weeks old and I have been very careful to be sure they didn't get cold or get around my other chicken babies. I separated the turkeys and the chickens. The only thing is that I feel like the royal palms were exposed to what ever the bourbon reds had because today one of the royal palms has started showing the same symptoms. On the same day I purchased the bourbon reds, I also purchased 2 Ameraucanas and a welsummer. The chickens are doing great and I have put them out in the coop today. I'm so concerned about the little royal palms. And by the way- once in a while they sneeze. Can anyone help? I don't know what else to do. It seems to be a contagious neurological issue... Which scares me for my own health and that of my chickens.

 

[sharvc]

Here's a bit more information.... I had kept the bourbon reds with my ameraucana chicks since I bough them all at the same time. I had put all 6 of them in the chicken tractor to play/ it's very hot here above 90. They had a great time! It was after that they became ill. I still kept all 6 turkeys and chicken babies together until I could see that whatever this was was an illness when the second turkey became sick I separated them all. However the only place I could keep them was turkeys in one place and chickens in another place. Since I still have to keep them separate from my older chickens. I thought maybe since it was neurological type symptoms that they had gotten into something toxic to th in the chicken run, maybe oyster shell or something, but now that these tiny babies are catching it too... I know it is a disease that is contagious to turkeys. My baby chicks still seem fine and I put them outside in the coop yesterday. However I'm a little concerned about it being forecast getting down to 52 tomorrow night. They won't get in a nesting box at night they are just huddling under it.

 

[Lozuufy]

So sorry, not sure what it could be, hope someone else knows.

 

[fairie]

I thought about having chickens and turkeys too but got put off by the danger of the chickens passing disease onto the turkeys. You can read a bit about here and more on Backyard Chicken.
http://www.communitychickens.com/read-this-before-you-get-turkey-poults/

 

[sharvc]

I don't know if it's black head. Their appetite stayed good right through the very end. No diarrhea until right at the very end. It's a long drawn out thing and antibiotics did not help. I'll do some more research on black head. Just not so sure that's what it is.

 

[fairie]

HI there is a new thread that just popped up, Dead Turkey HELP, check it out they seem to be very knowledgeable. Good luck