@HayesCircus It's been some time but I believe it took about 2-4 weeks for that lady to heal up. We kept her isolated with a couple of mellow chickens and to keep her company as other ducks were picking on her and she couldn't keep up physically. Her lung was permanently deflated as she would get winded very easily and she floated at a canter when she went into the water. The main help was the stitch in the crop and the outer stitch because I had a male duck with a similar problem and i didn't stitch the crop, food was getting into his lung.... he died of infection. The other problem with him vs. her was that she was kept in our living room in a beer box during her entire healing process, the male was out in the barn and we had to continuously clean maggots out of the wound. In both of these situations the wound was quite large (the lady had a hold the size of a quarter or fifty cent piece and the male had a very large tear. I have had other dog attacks on muskovi/chickens and they seem to live through it fine depending on the wound location and severity. If they are simple puncture wounds from teeth and not tears then I just give them a shot of penicillin or a water-additive antibiotic plus a lot of electrolytes and isolate them in a cage off of the ground. They usually heal up nicely if the holes are not along the back (dorsal). I've had dogs pounce on birds and bite their backs and they usually die even with a single hole, i'm not sure if it's due to the wound being so close to the spine or the weight of the dog pouncing but it's never good. Shallow punctures on the side or the breast typically heal themselves and require little more than sanitary conditions, peroxide, and antibiotics. best to pluck all feathers away from the hole because they will harbor disease, also be prepared to tweezer out the holes prior to using peroxide to debris the hole. having some blood stop bleed powder would be handy too
