Hens skin on neck sliced wide open on fence

[Birdielee]

Yowzer, shezadandy! 2:54 am? I do that, too. So bad. Should sleep.
But you're west coast. Maybe it was 3 hours different?

 

[Shezadandy]

Yowzer, shezadandy! 2:54 am? I do that, too. So bad. Should sleep.
But you're west coast. Maybe it was 3 hours different?

Yes, I'm in Oregon and I'm also a critter of the night, often up well past 2. Because of the virus, DH has been working from home so my computer access is usually late night - I hate typing on my phone, too slow. So now most of my posts are at odd hours.

 

[Shezadandy]

Thanks. And good to know for the kaytee. As far as scrubbing the gunk aroind the edges, are you talking about the uninjured skin to the left that is stiff? Or do you mean the scabby wound? A chunk of scab fell off, did you see? ! ! !

I would go after the whoooole thing, being very gentle on the injured area, in order to just 'clean slate' the area - it that might get the top layer stuff to dissolve a bit so your treatment ointments get to the healing areas. Betadine surgical scrub is 7.5% povidone-iodine, so if you make up a solution of dish soap and have approximately 7% iodine mixed in …

What I like to do is do a quart or so of my cleaning solution with warm water (so 2.25oz of iodine mixed in if you're doing regular dish soap to 32oz) -and have Qtips on hand too. The syringe makes it really easy to target the area and for whatever reason I've found my birds don't worry about syringes. Anyhow, draw a syringe full at a time from that quart solution and get it (and the areas immediately above and below and on the sides) saturated. It might take a bit for things to soften up.

Qtips are for targeted scrubbing, like trying to knock the globs off the surrounding feathers, that sort of thing, and for delicate areas around the wound to gently scrape whatever has loosened and wants to come off. For whatever reason my birds accept the Qtip better than paper towels or washcloths and it makes it easy to see what you're doing

I would have the curved scissors ready if there's a chunk of clearly dead scab that's just kinda hanging around, or to trim feathers that have collected a bunch of collateral debris from the treatments as close to the skin as possible.

Then of course rinse the area thoroughly (use the syringe to rinse with warm water) - then a paper towel dab to get the excess moisture- and I would just let everything dry in the open. If she'll tolerate the blow dryer for drying up the feathered areas, do that- but don't aim the heat/dry air directly at the wound.

Then once everything is dry (skin, feathers)… TAKE PICTURES!!! so you've got an unhindered reference for what's closing up, where the healing is etc. Then would do the Vetricyn first, and then your normal stuff afterwards.

So excited that she's on the mend and eating and regenerating tissue! Awesome job!

 

[Birdielee]

It ALL FELL OFF! And it ALL HEALED closed!! Even the neck muscle is covered with skin!! She's very much less cooperative with photos though

 

[Birdielee]

There IS a chunk of scab still hanging on, i think it's attached by a stitch and maybe a feather. Ill cut it off tomorrow, maybe , if it's still there. Or maybe not. There's airflow beneath.
This is great. It looks better than in the photos.

 

[Birdielee]

2 weeks and 3 days.

 

[Birdielee]

4.6 lbs? Seems wrong. Scale said error. But it often does.

 

[Birdielee]

I'm so excited for you all to see!
How long before feathers come in? Next molt or soon?

 

[Lauravonsmurf]

Great job...

 

[Birdielee]

I vetericyned her this afternoon and put triple antibiotic and corona lanolin cream on the new tissue tonight. No vet wrap. Tomorrow i plan to do a big cleanup.