Necrosis on toe (CPQ chick)

[bhex]

Hello all,

I have a couple week old chinese painted quail chick that had apparently developed a problem in its right foot's middle toe, which has progressed to necrosis. The first joint is shriveled and black, rest of the toe is slightly swollen and reddish. Some redness is present on the left foot as well. No idea what could have caused this; other chicks' feet are healthy, and this chick is also healthy otherwise. My guess is the toe might have got snagged up in something. How should I proceed with this? Do I just let it be and the dead joint will eventually fall away, or does this require amputation? Please refer to the photos for the condition, photos taken a day ago. The dead part looks more "dry" now but otherwise the same. It has not spread from what I can tell. All help is welcome.

Edit: I've given the chick a small amount of pain medication twice.

 

[bhex]

A new photo taken just now.

 

[coach723]

It looks like something got wrapped around the toe and cut off circulation. Something as small as a hair or feather bit could have done it. I've zoomed in all three pictures so that you can see bits of something sticking out from the area. It will eventually drop off on it's own. They can do fine with missing toes, I would just continue to watch and make sure that no signs of infection show up.

 

[bhex]

It looks like something got wrapped around the toe and cut of circulation. Something as small as a hair or feather bit could have done it. I've zoomed in all three pictures so that you can see bits of something sticking out from the area. It will eventually drop off on it's own. They can do fine with missing toes, I would just continue to watch and make sure that no signs of infection show up.

Oh wow, good catch! The zooming in really helped since in real life the toe is very very tiny. Let's hope the chick will endure through this. Thanks for your reply!

 

[bhex]

Important update. Out of six chicks, five have some issues with their feet. I don't think a piece of string was the issue, it's something else.

The first one I showed in this thread had the dead bit fall off now but the rest of the toe is quite swollen. There's another chick with a dead toe end as well. The other three have swollen and bloody middle part (don't know the proper name for it) but for this I believe I have an explanation, sort of. The mother hen has had a criminal record of pecking chicks' feet so most of the damage could be caused by her. I don't know if there was some swelling beforehand that prompted her to start pecking, but more importantly the pecking doesn't explain the necrosis on the tips of the toes. Those were never bloody, just shriveled.

I have now separated the chicks from the parents, gave pain medication to the chicks with worse injuries, plus disinficted the wounds and applied wound & skin care hydrogel. Any other ideas what this could be?

Attached are photos of all the five chicks' feet.

Photo 1: first chick's toe with the dead bit fallen off
Photo 2: worst pecking damage (and a weirdly bent toe)
Photo 3: another toe tip necrosis (another weirdly bent toe)
Photo 4: minor swelling on the right foot and a tiny black scab
Photo 5: swelling and pecking damage on left foot

 

[coach723]

Where are they all kept? Is there something in there that could be catching feet and toes? Wire, bedding, feeders, edges somewhere,etc? Those are some tiny feet and toes, even a very small gap or space could be an issue. I would not let that hen raise chicks again since she has a history of doing damage to their feet and toes. Just wondering if something happened first and the injuries drew her interest, or if she caused it all. Whatever happened, when the damage impacts circulation, the digit will die off beyond where there is adequate blood flow. In know in chickens the end of the digit where there is loss will often swell, part of the process in the body sealing it off and healing. I would make sure there is no bad smell, if the hydro gel doesn't seem to help then use some plain triple antibiotic ointment on the affected parts.

 

[bhex]

Where are they all kept? Is there something in there that could be catching feet and toes? Wire, bedding, feeders, edges somewhere,etc? Those are some tiny feet and toes, even a very small gap or space could be an issue. I would not let that hen raise chicks again since she has a history of doing damage to their feet and toes. Just wondering if something happened first and the injuries drew her interest, or if she caused it all. Whatever happened, when the damage impacts circulation, the digit will die off beyond where there is adequate blood flow. In know in chickens the end of the digit where there is loss will often swell, part of the process in the body sealing it off and healing. I would make sure there is no bad smell, if the hydro gel doesn't seem to help then use some plain triple antibiotic ointment on the affected parts.

They're kept in a cage with wooden chips (for rodents, reptiles, birds, etc.) and hay as the bedding. I've made the cages as quail-safe as possible; I've had adults and chicks in set-ups like this for years and never had such problems before. I will have to hope the injuries will heal now that the chicks and the parents were separated. It's too bad because the dad quail was a great father

 

[coach723]

So sorry. The only other choice would be to remove them after hatch, or to incubate the eggs , unless you want to risk it happening again. I don't have any experience with quail, so don't know if there are other things that might make a hen do this to her chicks. I know with chickens, unless it's a very young mom that might improve with some maturing, if she's a bad mom, I just don't let raise chicks again. I hope the chicks all recover and do well.

 

[bhex]

Update: I was away a few days and this is what the worst injuries look like now (photos are a day old).

The swelling keeps getting worse on the toe that lost the tip. The bulb is hard and doesn't feel like it has pus/blood inside. Chick doesn't pull away when I poke it, so I guess it's not very painful?

The chick with the worst pecking injuries is doing great, the feet are healing well.

The status of the other chick with a toe tip necrosis is unknown. I think the affected toe is somewhat more swollen than before, but I'm still wondering why it's bent in such a weird way. Another toe on the other foot is looking a bit dark too so I'm slightly worried of that.

If these guys weren't so damn small I'd consider going to the vet for amputations more seriously At a loss here otherwise.

 

[MegTheHenEggQueen]

They're kept in a cage with wooden chips (for rodents, reptiles, birds, etc.) and hay as the bedding. I've made the cages as quail-safe as possible; I've had adults and chicks in set-ups like this for years and never had such problems before. I will have to hope the injuries will heal now that the chicks and the parents were separated. It's too bad because the dad quail was a great father

This is the first time I did a hatch after 1 year of my incubator constantly on hatching quail where I used wood shavings instead of just paper towels at the bottom of the brooder and every single one of my quail (34) had this happen! I have 4 that it’s pretty minimal and just the toe nails for now that I’m keeping separate but the rest are together with necrosis and infection. Sadly I will have to cull them all. And my next hatch I will go back to paper towels and see what the outcome is!