Hen with difficulty swallowing

[Daphy63]

Hi!

I have an odd situation with a 5yr old hen.

She nolonger lays, but until now has been very healthy and is the flocks leader.

A few days ago i noticed she wasn’t as enthusiastic as normal about her mealy worm treat and when she tried to eat them they made her sneeze and drool. She started to drink water and carried on for a while, stretching her neck and gulping at the water. The next day i saw her do a similar thing.

She hasn’t lost weight, she wants to eat and drink, but can’t easily swallow anything. I have checked her throat, and used a Qtip to see if there is any sign of gapeworm, but nothing there. Her breathing is fine, her comb and wattle are bright red. She is very lively as normal, and i have been hand feeding her scrambled egg and cat food to keep her going.

Her voice is quite soft compared to normal, and her poop is greenish but firm, no liquid. Apart from the swallowing and drooling issue, she is pretty much her normal self.

I live in France and do not have access to an avian vet, so i self prescribe and medicate my flock. I don’t want to medicate without any idea what this issue is, so if anyone has any ideas, i would be really grateful for your input.

I have also checked her crop and it is emptying as normal. No smell of sour crop, and no weird smell from her poop or rear end either.

I had wondered about capillary worms in her crop/oesophagus, but not come across them before, so not sure. I do worm the flock regularly with Flubenvet every six months or so, and in between times a local herbal concoction to keep the worms under control. The flock was last wormed 8 weeks ago.

She is an older lady i know, and about 4 weeks ago i added 3 new bantams to my garden (6 months old, 1 cock and two girls) all vaccinated and still in quarantine, so it could be something to do with them, but i doubt it.

Any ideas anyone?

 

[AidKD]

Check both of her ears for swelling, puss, or redness. An ear infection could be the cause of her issue.

 

[Daphy63]

Thanks AidKD

Thought I would give an update, as this situation is still ongoing, and there may be someone else with a similar situation.

I checked her ears and her throat again and found a large yellowish growth deep down her throat. It looked pretty horrible, but no smell. I also noticed I could feel the growth from the outside of her neck, and it was very hard and large.

We contacted our local vet and explained the situation. Initially they wanted to prescribe AB’s but I didn’t think they would work, it looked to me like Canker, or possibly Wet Fowl Pox. As WFP is a virus and untreatable, we treated for Canker and the Vet prescribed Metrovis. We completed the 10 day course of medication, but there has been no improvement, in fact she is much worse. Unable to eat or drink on her own, I have been hand feeding and using a syringe to hydrate her. Yesterday, we contacted the Vet again, and he agreed to see her and take some swabs of her throat, but he was reluctant to do this as he knows very little about poultry.

We are now waiting for the results.

Although none of my other flock members are showing any signs of illness, I did treat them all with ACS, and upped their vitamin intake. However if this turns out to be WFP, then that is whole different issue.

I did find a really useful post from 2014/15 for FP/WFP. I never knew how horrible it could be, and I am hoping I will never have to deal with an outbreak.

I’ll update when I have the results.

 

[AidKD]

Thanks AidKD

Thought I would give an update, as this situation is still ongoing, and there may be someone else with a similar situation.

I checked her ears and her throat again and found a large yellowish growth deep down her throat. It looked pretty horrible, but no smell. I also noticed I could feel the growth from the outside of her neck, and it was very hard and large.

We contacted our local vet and explained the situation. Initially they wanted to prescribe AB’s but I didn’t think they would work, it looked to me like Canker, or possibly Wet Fowl Pox. As WFP is a virus and untreatable, we treated for Canker and the Vet prescribed Metrovis. We completed the 10 day course of medication, but there has been no improvement, in fact she is much worse. Unable to eat or drink on her own, I have been hand feeding and using a syringe to hydrate her. Yesterday, we contacted the Vet again, and he agreed to see her and take some swabs of her throat, but he was reluctant to do this as he knows very little about poultry.

We are now waiting for the results.

Although none of my other flock members are showing any signs of illness, I did treat them all with ACS, and upped their vitamin intake. However if this turns out to be WFP, then that is whole different issue.

I did find a really useful post from 2014/15 for FP/WFP. I never knew how horrible it could be, and I am hoping I will never have to deal with an outbreak.

I’ll update when I have the results.

Ugh, hope it turns out to be less complicated then it sounds. Best of luck with the vet! Looking forward to the next update!

 

[tjogowin]

Thanks AidKD

Thought I would give an update, as this situation is still ongoing, and there may be someone else with a similar situation.

I checked her ears and her throat again and found a large yellowish growth deep down her throat. It looked pretty horrible, but no smell. I also noticed I could feel the growth from the outside of her neck, and it was very hard and large.

We contacted our local vet and explained the situation. Initially they wanted to prescribe AB’s but I didn’t think they would work, it looked to me like Canker, or possibly Wet Fowl Pox. As WFP is a virus and untreatable, we treated for Canker and the Vet prescribed Metrovis. We completed the 10 day course of medication, but there has been no improvement, in fact she is much worse. Unable to eat or drink on her own, I have been hand feeding and using a syringe to hydrate her. Yesterday, we contacted the Vet again, and he agreed to see her and take some swabs of her throat, but he was reluctant to do this as he knows very little about poultry.

We are now waiting for the results.

Although none of my other flock members are showing any signs of illness, I did treat them all with ACS, and upped their vitamin intake. However if this turns out to be WFP, then that is whole different issue.

I did find a really useful post from 2014/15 for FP/WFP. I never knew how horrible it could be, and I am hoping I will never have to deal with an outbreak.

I’ll update when I have the results.

Hi, have you got an update on your hen? I have a very similar issue with my 6 year old hen. Thankd

 

[Daphy63]

Hi, have you got an update on your hen? I have a very similar issue with my 6 year old hen. Thankd

So after waiting a week for the lab results, what we received wasn’t what we or the vet were expecting.

It turns out she has a high infection rate of Pseudomonas - Weeksella virosa and Brevundimonas Diminuta. There were also lower infection rates of e-coli, Gallibacterium abatis and Rothia mucilaginosa. I’ve written them giving their Latin names so you have the generic names for you to look up, rather than the names in French.

The vet has prescribed Amoxcil for cats and dogs (100mg per day), and she is now on her 5th day without any improvement. In fact she has got worse. Gurgling and wheezing, gasping for breath, she won’t eat or drink at all, even when hand fed, so I am not expecting her to last much longer. From researching these infections, they are pretty hard to get rid of, and I think she was too far into the infections to save her.

I hope you can save your chicken #tjogowin, I think if you can keep your girl eating and drinking, they have the strength to fight the infections, but my chicken (LB is her name), is just too weak to fight anymore.