Is my turkey going to be OK?? Predator injury with pics. HELP!

[khs2424]

I came home from work today to find one of my poor turkeys with a bad injury to his/her neck. It's a 6 week old eastern turkey. I'm sure it was some kind of predator attack because I found a spot around the back with a pile of feathers an a "pulled" spot in the wire. I'm going to line the bottom of the coop with hardware cloth to avoid anymore attacks but my main concern now is if the turkey is going to be ok and what can I do to help it heal. Thanks!

Here are the pics of the injury.

 

[Frosty]

Is there enough skin there where you can pull it back over and super glue it in place?

 

[khs2424]

Not sure but if I had to guess, no. It's pretty big.

 

[jamesnoldsr]

Oh my goodness. Where are you located? I actually had a chicken with a similar injury that I fixed (don't cringe) with a sewing needle and dental floss to sew it up. The chicken healed just fine.

 

[ivan3]

Have another person hold the turk under an arm (pinning wings- keep legs out to side so it paddles air and can't use feet against clothing to bolt around. Have the `holder' use the other hand to lift turk's head and extend neck upwards (see if there are puncture wounds in `throat' - but, more importantly, check whether edges of skin come together evenly in this position - return any protruding internal `works' to proper location). If edges of skin meet then stitch up and start on course of Pen G (probably easiest injectable antibiotic to get ahold of at feed store).

If suturing is successful bring it indoors in temp. digs and observe that it can drink/eat without any leakage (if draining to outside of wound I'd put it down).

It is young and the position of head/neck in second shot indicates it probably didn't suffer too much muscle damage.

Good luck!

 

[aggieterpkatie]

I'm thinking she'll heal. It's amazing what birds can live through. I had a chicken with a similar wound and she healed up just fine, although chickens are sometimes more resilient than turkeys.

 

[greymane]

That is a nasty wound. I hope all works out and she heals quickly.

 

[syble]

i realize they are smaller, but i've had coturnix produce similar damage(some worse), 2 biggest things are to make sure the others don't peck at it (a liberal application of no peck helps) and no infection. as long as it eats and drinks, everything should heal well.

 

[khs2424]

It seems to be eating and drinking fairly well. I looked closely at the wound and there doesn't seem to be enough skin to do any type of repair with. Think I'm going to have to just let her/him be and see what happens. The others don't seem to be pecking at it so that's good. What can I do to try and prevent infection?

 

[ivan3]

Is there muscle/throat (anything that shouldn't be outside of the skin) protruding from wound? If not, I'd probably cover a 2"x2" gauze pad with antibiotic ointment - place over wound and wrap neck in gauze - use paper dressing tape above and below gauze wrapping to hold in place (hard area for beak to really pick at). Mentioned the Injectable Penicillin in previous post. Also, is turk with other chooks/turks that can pick at the wound?

Sorry, but pics simply don't show sufficient detail to give better info. Most important that any internal tissues not be exposed to air.