Open wound

[City Farmer Jim]

Good morning all, this is not an emergency(yet) I hope. We have a 10-11 week old barred Rock pullet that has an open wound on the back of her skull that was noticed this morning. I noticed feathers out of place and didn't think much of it. Today is the day we had decided to integrate her to the BIG girls flock. The wounded bird(COCO) is 10-11 weeks ish we are not real sure and think possibly a couple weeks older and her "flock" is 2-8 week old gold lace Wyandottes and 2-5 week old blue laced Wyandottes. Any way we let her in with the big girls and all went fairly well. The HEAD HEN had to assert her dominance and pecked her on the back of her skull and I broke that up and 20 ish minutes later she was after her again and same thing...went for the back of her skull. I separated them and checked COCO to see if she was pecked in the eye. I decided to check her head and found an open wound but not fresh. I have put antibiotics on it until my girlfriend gets home so we can check it out further....what is the best method for doing a home wound care. I'm thinking hydrogen peroxide to clean it up and neosporin...ADVICE is GREATLY APPRECIATED. I'm in south Texas and it is VERY WARM AND HUMID.

 

[Chicks n Pipes]

I've had this happen more than I like to say, and that's exactly what I do. I have never lost one from it. If you are worried about flys cover it and around the wound with a whole ton of vasiline. Good luck!

 

[RumneyRoost]

Yes I’ve got one hen who always causes trouble with new birds. She’s one of my favourites though so she’s safe.
Last year she pecked my young barred rock, causing a fairly large wound on her head. I flushed it with saline solution and kept it covered with a thick layer of polysporin (without pain relief).
It healed nicely, other than a small scar near her eye. Her name was already Rocky.

 

[City Farmer Jim]

Thank you....it looks worse than it is. We are going to get a small supply of "Blue Kote"(antibiotic antifungal) in addition to neosporin and saline solution. ...I appreciate your quick reply to my almost emergency.

 

[coach723]

I had a chicken get almost scalped. You could see her skull. I cleaned it with veterycin spray, applied neosporin as needed to keep it covered and moist. It healed up fine and looks normal now. Make sure other birds don't/can't continue to pick at it.
Picture below was 4 - 6 weeks later, feathers were just starting to come in.

 

[City Farmer Jim]

Girls can be SO mean to one another lol. I guess our child rearing kicks in even on chickens, we flushed it with peroxide and sprayed vetracine on the area. We have isolated her for tonight in a pet carrier and we already had a isolation cage ready for the next broody hen(whole other story) for her the next few days. Her "flock" is not happy she is being separated but they will get over it.

 

[City Farmer Jim]

I had a chicken get almost scalped. You could see her skull. I cleaned it with veterycin spray, applied neosporin as needed to keep it covered and moist. It healed up fine and looks normal now. Make sure other birds don't/can't continue to pick at it.
Picture below was 4 - 6 weeks later, feathers were just starting to come in.
View attachment 2082190

How long did you have to segregate her from the rest of the flock? I had hoped to integrate this week/weekend.

 

[coach723]

I kept her separated until it was healed enough not to be a pecking risk. It was pretty much scabbed over. Once it's scabbed you can use blu kote to disguise it if it helps.

 

[City Farmer Jim]

Did you need to stitch up/superglue the wound together or did it heal back together on its own ?

 

[RumneyRoost]

My little Rocky just had an open wound so nothing to stitch or glue.
She was about 6 weeks old at the time, I let her stay with the other two chicks, they didn’t bother her.
I waited until the wound scabbed over before reintroducing them to the older birds. In the meantime I kept the chicks in a large dog crate inside the coop/run so they could continue with “see, no touch”.