New member with a bit of a problem

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crz53

crz53

Hatching
9 Years
Apr 7, 2010
2
0
7
Howdy,
My name is Mike Lorenz. I live in suburban St.Louis. I have owned chickens for about 1 year. My initial flock was a grab bag of 6 unsexed chicks from Baker Creek Farms in Mansfield, Missouri. It wound up consisting of 3 Bantam hens (Small Chick, Chirpy Boy, and Choo Choo Train), 1 Bantam rooster (Bart Jr), 1 Crested Sultan rooster (Puff & Stuff), and one weird, turkey/chicken hen (Turkey Boy). The roosters got shipped off to my parents farm because we're not allowed to have them in our neighborhood. The remaining 4 were growing nicely, and enjoyed clearing out weedy garden beds while living in their chicken tractor. They started laying early last fall. In early January 2010, they got upgraded to a nicer coop and run. They also got 3 new coop mates in the form of 3 hens that "Santa" brought my kids from a farm by my parents' house. They included 1 Black Austrolorp (Hoppy 1), 1 Chantelcer (Hoppy 2), and 1 New Hampshire Red (Scratchy), as best I can tell. This is where the trouble started.

The new hens seemed to get along fine with the original 4, but I'm afraid that they may have been carrying some sort of disease with them. In early February, I noticed that some of them had diarrhea and I found a couple of broken, soft-shell eggs. I'm also pretty sure that I heard one or two of the chickens sneeze. I looked around on the internet tubes (including BYC) trying to figure out what the deal was, and then on February 15th, I found Turkey Boy dead in their run. Two days later, Choo Choo Train died in the coop, and I was in a minor panic. It seemed to be some sort of respiratory illness, and I saw that some people had recommended antibiotics or other drugs. I wasn't sure where to get them, and to be honest, I didn't have the money for expensive chicken medicine. Things seemed to clear up as the weather warmed. The diarrhea was pretty much gone, I didn't hear any sneezing, and I hadn't found any more soft-shell eggs. Then two weeks ago, I found another of the soft eggs. The Bantams hadn't been laying like they used to, and I wasn't sure what was going on. We were out of town for two days, and when I came back yesterday, I found Chirpy Boy dead in the coop. Her head had been partially cannibalized.

I don't know what to do about this. I'm not even sure exactly what the problem is. If it's something that the new hens were carrying, do I need to get rid of all of them and start the flock over? If that's the case, do you need to sterilize the coop? Can you eat the chickens? I don't know. I just don't want to sit around and watch them drop off one at a time. Thanks for any help you guys can give. Hopefully my future posts won't be quite so dire.
- Mike Lorenz
www.newgrowthhomestead.blogspot.com
 
Sorry, no clue, can't help, but good luck!
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This is terrible!!! Those new chickens likely were ill. New chickens should be quaranteened from your existing flock for (so I have read here on BYC) for 30 days so that you can observe the new ones for signs of illness. Either watch them and potentially watch them drop off, or get rid of them and start fresh. If you dont get answers on cleaning, search the index. So sorry that this has happened. Its so sad...
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I am a newbie to this site as well. So welcome! Sorry for all your losses. I'll try to help best I can.

Yes, all new poultry should be separated for the 1st month you have them. I suspect that your new birds are "carriers" of something and have passed it to your original birds. Some things can be treated and the birds go on to live normal lives. Unfortunately they become carriers and infect other birds around them. You then face the challenge of catching it early and treating the newly infected birds, on and on. It is a viscious cycle. Really what I would do is get rid of all them and clean everything they have ever come in contact with. Not always easy to get rid of animals with names. As far as the cleaning, I would scrub any caked spots and I like to use a diluted bleach solution and douse the area real good and let it sit empty and air dry. Then you could start from scratch.

I don't recall if you said which chickens(the old ones or the new ones) were laying the soft shelled eggs. Usually a diet problem. Layer pellets have calcium in them, but I would still offer oyster shell free choice to supplement.

As far as the sneeze goes, if I have time, I do the least invasive thing possible. Start simple and work my way up. VetRx is a good product. Antibiotics aren't really too expensive for a good broad spectrum(less than $10). All you do is add it to the water. Hope this helps and good luck!
 
I think it's especially significant that the new birds appear healthy and all your old birds are sick or dying after exposure to the new birds. It sounds like the new birds were carrying some sort of illness that they passed onto your birds. The really bad news is, even if your birds recover from this (with or without medicine) they will likely be carriers, too and you can never sell any of them or add new birds to the flock.
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Call your state vet and they'll often test your birds for free. I was able to find the closest state vet's office through my state's Dept of Agriculture website and they took blood samples and saliva swabs from my flock to test for diseases. They will also necropsy dead birds to find out what they died from. That would go a long way towards knowing what you're dealing with and learning if the survivors will be carriers or not.

If you choose to cull and start over, I think you should clean and disinfect the coop before getting new birds. (I use Oxine AH on my coop.) Most big hatcheries test their breeding flocks for diseases and are usually a good bet to get healthy chicks.

I'm sorry you're going through this right now.
 

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