hurt chick!

[catballou24]

if anyone read my other posts, i just got 5 new chicks yesterday who are suppose to be around 4.5 months old. they are kind of small though, but i have no reason to doubt the gal who sold them to me. she owns the local feed store and i've seen her set-up and she appears to have amazingly beautiful living conditions for her animals..haha but i digress...anyway, one of the newbies - a leghorn - got out yesterday and spent the night outside as we couldn't catch her. we got her today and thought all was well until i just went out there and caught her jersey giant friends that she came with, pecking the living $%#! out of her head. she has a huge wound on her head now but appears alright otherwise. i put her in a large dog carrier and brought her in the house. she looks like she was scalped to be honest..

what can i do? she has fresh food and water...is in the cool house and in a carrier that is big enough for a med-large dog. i thought my bigger chickens would peck the newbies, but i never suspected the newbies of pecking each other. it's like they were mad at her for breaking free!

she is very flighty and not into being held, so i am not sure if i can hold her long enough to put anything on her....

will she be okay? i don't even think i can get a good picture of it...poor little gal..

 

[peepsnbunnies]

Even though she is flighty, I would hold her long enough to clean it and put neosporin on it. I would also give her poultry vitamin/electrolyte water because she is stressed. I had one that got pecked on the head by an bigger chicken. I had a flock of 14 juveniles and two of the largest picked on this one little girl and bloodied her head. I cleaned her up making sure I got ALL signs of blood off her (she is a white silkie! Peroxide helped with that part), and put neosporin on her. I kept her and two of her silblings in a seperate cage from the flock, but the cages were always right next to each other so everyone stayed used to seeing each other. Every day I would switch out the two siblings for two different siblings to keep everyone used to each other. It only took a week for her to heal and because everyone was right next to each other the whole time, it was not a problem when I put them back together. Good Luck

Lisa

 

[catballou24]

thanks..i'll try to get ahold of her long enough to put some neosporin on it. it's been so hot here lately that i don't want to leave her in the dog cage outside, but i need them to at least forgive her! they all lived together before this, so i don't know what happened other than the fact that she was running free for 24 hours...

the bigger chickens pretty much leave the newbies alone except for my dominant hen. she's big enough though that if she was going to really try and hurt this one, she would have done more than a scalping. and i saw the black jersey giants pecking at her anyway..

it's not so much bloody as just de-feathered and raw looking...

maybe i can make a quick cage tomorrow for her to be in so she can still hang out with the others but not get pecked...

thanks so much for your suggestion!

 

[dlhunicorn]

First get the things you need to flush the wound : (sterile saline >simply boil a quart of water with 1/4 tsp salt for five minutes and let cool)...you will need a syringe with needle or something similar to flush the area >be careful not to get into nares while doing this (you may need to gently tilt the birds head forward to ensure the water can not in any way be enhaled) also you will need triple antibiotic such as neosporin to apply after you have flushed with the saline and the iodine "tea" or disinfectant...
BEFORE YOU START RESTRAIN THE BIRD >restrain the bird with a towel...if possible get someone to help you...be calm and move slowly..."cup" the birds neck encircling it with your hand and wrap the appropriate sized towel around the bird...Do not constrict the bird’s chest during restraint. A bird must be able to
expand the thorax to inspire air>the towel is to restrict its movement but not so intensely that it affects its ability to breathe...
Ideally you will have someone to hold the bird in the towel leaving you free to flush and clean the wound and apply the neosporin...