Is this Angel Wing?

[LilyD]

So my sister hatched out a late batch of ducks and gave me 4 of the little ducks once they were 5 weeks old. I kept them separate until they were 8 weeks old (Halloween day) and they did fine. They are eating chick grower with extra niacin. Since all my birds (chickens and ducks) free range together during the day I only feed the chick grower and supplement with extra niacin for the ducks and free choice oyster shell for the chickens since I have so many drakes running around ( 9 so far) I didn't want to use a layer feed and potentially make them sick.

So I noticed on of the little girls wing feathers are flopped out from her body. Her wing feathers are very full of blood and so my question is would this be Angel wing and should I wrap it or is it just really heavy wings on a very tiny little girl. They are almost the same size as the girls I have that are 15 weeks but are a little smaller and definitely much smaller than the boys we have running around. The little girl in question will be 9 weeks old as of Friday. Any help or suggestions would be great. Thank you

 

[Amiga]

I have not had that in my flock, but it does look to me like angel wing. Wrapping can work and at the same time, you want to be very careful not to cut off circulation. There are directions on the forum somewhere….

 

[Miss Lydia]

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/...how-we-wrap-to-mend-it-pictorial#post_8682154 Wrap ASAP while blood feathers are still coming in if you wait till they are already in it maybe too late. and be careful not to wrap to tight like Amiga said

 

[Rachele anne]

I had one like that .. I put the wing in the normal position and taped the wing tip to the base of the wing in a figure 8 shape but not to the body as they don't find it as comfortable and leave it for like 3 days then cut off the tape and carefully peal off the tape maybe even use water to help loosen and the wings will b stiff after but in a day or two should be fine ... if not corrected then tape again for another two or three days and that should do it ... I used medical tape

 

[Rachele anne]

Wish I had a picture to show u but I don't think I do, but like they said above it already has pretty decent sized flightfeathers mine was only 2 inches long when I started to tape them...but it's worth a try can't hurt..and don't worry if it doesn't fix the bird is perfectly fine it doesn't affect them at all..just doesn't look as pretty

 

[JoyAnna]

One of my four ducklings had one wing sticking out noticably by the time she was 4 or 5 weeks of age. I tried four or five times to tape her following the post given above and several others I searched out online. I live alone and could only get help a few times. In any case, she managed to get out of the wraps every time. (I was using vetwrap taped together.) I finally decided that she and the other ducklings were so traumatized being caught and treated thusly, so I gave up. I did quickly change the ducklings feed to a lower protein pellet and got them outside foraging on a lot of green stuff (including comfry leaves). Now at nearly 9 weeks old, the wing is a little bit droopy, and she doesn't seem to get it all the way up on her back, but she flaps it vigorously, and I think it may be looking more normal. There doesn't seem to be any agreement among the experts as to the cause, but she is doing okay, and is one happy duck.

 

[LilyD]

I had one duck earlier that was like that and I was told it wasn't angel wing but was just a heavy wing because of the blood flow. Bruiser (one of my drakes) is now 15 weeks and is doing really well with perfectly normal wings.

My little girl Yin is doing much better. We are using vet wrap and just made sure to make it fairly wide rather than a skinny band over the wing. So far so good she has been wrapped since the day I started this post. Going to keep her wrapped until Wednesday and then take it off and give her a break and see how it looks. I have another whole roll of vet wrap if we need it but if she looks much better I will just let her be. The other ducks aren't bothering her at all even though she is wrapped and I think it is much less traumatizing since she can be with her sisters.

 

[Rachele anne]

Just remember she will be stiff so don't freak out when she goes to flap her wings and doesn't extend them all the way

 

[LilyD]

Took her wrap off this morning and she looks good. Her wings are a bit stiff but she is enjoying grooming them. When she moves they are up on her back where they are supposed to be. I will try to get some pictures this afternoon.

 

[Orca5094]

That's great! Glad the wrapping seems to have worked. It will take a day or so for her to be able to fully extend the wings again after being stuck in that position, but then you will be able to tell for sure if it has worked. Sometimes it does, sometimes they will start to turn out again after a couple days. How long did you have her wrapped?

A little physical therapy helps alot after they've had their wings wrapped for awhile. If she's not too crazy and will let you, you can hold her and very slowly and gently extend the wings one at a time all the way out, then back in. Repeat a few times for each wing several times a day. This helps alot to make sure her joints don't get "frozen" into place and she will have full range of motion in the wings again much faster (usually within a day).