mr. chicken lost his crow..

[Mrs.Puff]

My Mr. Chicken, a banty EE, about 2 years old, has lost his crow. He tries to crow, but nothing much comes out. Just a scratchy noise. He seems kinda droopy, but not sick or anything. He seems depressed. What's wrong with him??!!

 

[chicknmania]

It's a common thing with roosters. But he probably needs an antibiotic. Can you start him on some Terramycin? The water soluble kind you can get at TSC, I think it's either 4 tsp or 4 tbsp per gallon; I'd have to check, dosage should be on here somewhere, you can ask at TSC, or I can let you know later...don't follow the confusing instructions on the package. Anyway, we had a roo with that problem, he never really got sick, in fact he may have had it twice or maybe it was two different ones, but one time we didn't even bother to treat the roo with anything, and he recovered by himself, we just gave the whole flock some vites/electrolytes in their water. We never really found out the cause either time and there might be lots of causes....to be on the safe side you should keep on eye on him and try at the very least the vitamins, and if that doesn't work in a day or two I would start him on the Terramycin.

 

[chicknmania]

Oh, you might want to quarantine him, too, just to be safe, although I don't think we did quarantine the one roo who had it, and no one else ever got sick. Sorry my memory is not very good, it was a long time ago.

 

[Mrs.Puff]

He's already been minus a crow for a couple two or three weeks. ugh. Probably too late to quarantine him.

 

[gumpsgirl]

If he's hasn't been crowing for that long and nobody else seems sick, then it more than likely isn't an illness or at least one that will spread. Try adding some ACV (organic with the mother in it) to the water. You should give 1 Tbs per gallon of water.

 

[Mrs.Puff]

I use ACV in the water every day, and he gets around just fine and dandy. I guess he's just got laryngitis.

 

[davidb]

Try adding some vet R/x in the water he might have a sinus problem

 

[chicknmania]

I asked my Ds about this...his memory is better than mine,. One time our roo had this, the whole flock was on antibiotics anyway...we went through a bad spell with the flock being sick...but only one roo was voiceless. So hard to say if the antibiotic made a difference, or not. Whatever it is, it doesn't affect them all in the same way. If he is droopy he probably does need some extra treatment...VetRX is a good idea..you probably already know they don't show illness symptoms much til they are very ill.

 

[Mrs.Puff]

None of the farm stores around me carry vetRX. Can you eat the eggs from birds on this med? I don't have any way to isolate him from my other birds. Last year, they all got pretty snorty and snotty, and a couple had swollen sinuses in the face. I culled those two. This year I've had a little bit of sneezing, but since I've been using ACV, not nearly as much as last year. We do not have any heat in the coop, so it gets kinda cold in there.

 

[chicknmania]

You can order VetRX, or it's equivalent, from the Chicken Doctor at www.firststatevetsupply.com. And I think McMurray Hatchery has it too and probably some of the other poultry websites. While you're at it you might want to order some Oxine to add a few drops to their drinking water to disinfect, (Since it's hard for you to quarantine him)it's nice to have around.0 there is also an over the counter cough syrup that you can get that is supposed to be the same as VetRX, if you search VetRX on here you should find it, sorry, once again I don't remember what it was...someone suggested it to me once on here and I couldn't find it locally, ...I think it was spotted crow, who suggested it maybe? (sorry, sc, if it wan't you)...oh, and if your birds are all sneezy, or quite a few of them, you might want to try the Terramycin for a week to ten days anyway for the whole flock. Then you can't eat the eggs for three weeks or so, after though. I don't know if you can eat the eggs with VetRX.