my rooster is hurt by a dog

[communityofhermits]

Hi...my beautiful rooster defended his hens bravely but a young hunting dog had it by the leg.....the neighbour got the rooster back and amazingly it seems like it has only hurt its leg....my husband can feel no breaks in the bones and it doesnt appear to be dislocated...there isnt even any breaks in the skin that we can see but the rooster favors the leg and puts almost no weight on it. We have isolated him in a warm dry place but does anyone else have any experience with this....do they tear ligaments....muscles???? If the leg is dislocated in the joint at the body how would we know? we are fairly new to chickens so any advice would be appreciated

 

[fiberart57]

Welcome to BackYard Chickens.

I've had no similar problems but you are correct in doing what you're doing now: Isolated, warm, dry, soft lighting. Check him for puncture wounds if you can, mainly along the thighs and wing areas where the dog had him. Try to keep him as restrained as possible, not moving too much. In addition, you could add some vitamins to his water, the feed store should sell electrolytes or you could get Polyvisol vitamins from the baby section of some grocery stores (with added iron) for supplement. High protein foods like scrambled eggs are good sources of food and energy. Symptom and nutritional support are what's needed now.

Good luck, it sounds like you are doing well so far.

Mary

 

[flakey chick]

You can also give him aspirin in his water. One regular aspirin per gallon. Crush it up and disolve it. I used aspirin on a hen with a sore leg and no other obvious sign of injury. It really helped her a lot.

 

[communityofhermits]

thanks guys for the advice...it is always good to know that you are on the right track....but i swear my husband speaks "chicken"