peck wounds on day old keet - PHOTOS

[TexGardenGirl]

This is a dual post - I put it in the Emergencies section and got no responses and realized it may be because all the guinea people are here instead.

This little keet hatched yesterday afternoon and was with chicken momma, 3 other keets and 3 chicks. It is the youngest, one more hatched this morning but is bigger, and the others hatched as early as 4 days ago. I went out to check on them about an hour ago and found her with a bloody neck. Here are the pix:

I immediately removed her, I have her inside in a mini-brooder, got the temp right and food & water available. I rinsed off her wound (it had bits of food stuck to it) and put a little wound powder on it. It looks terrible, like the skin has been pulled off. In fact it kind of seemed like little flaps of skin were hanging down when I was rinsing, but now that's she's dry not so much. Any ideas on what else I should do? She seemed very unbalanced at first but is looking more stable now. I do have neosporin but haven't used it yet. It's so thick and the area is so raw, I'm not even sure how to spread it on effectively. That's why I used the wound powder, but it's just herbal, not an actual antibiotic, and it soaked in pretty fast too.
Thanks!

A couple more thoughts.
1) Does this even have a chance of healing? It's an area about as big as a penny that's missing the skin. I imagine it will take quite awhile for it to grow back even without complications.
2) What's it going to be like for the keet to grow up without siblings? How will it fit back into the flock once grown? I've had to remove chickens for awhile before, but they were always at least several weeks old at the time.
3) Is there any chance of having a house guinea? I could be really aggressive about bonding with it and taming it, but I have no clue how that would work for a guinea...

Thanks for any advice anyone might have.

 

[chicmom]

That looks a bit like the brain is exposed........Do you think it's just a birth defect, maybe?

 

[TexGardenGirl]

I think it's just the way the light shines in the photo - I looked more closely & poked gently - it's just swollen head flesh. She looked totally normal before the attack. I did put neosporin on it and she's actually acting fairly normal. I know there's still a chance of infection for awhile but I'm really more worried about her social development. She now has a bunny and a mouse toy in her box for company.

 

[racuda]

I had one like that that got pecked on the head. It was practically scalped. I sprayed Blue Koat on it and it healed just fine. After a couple of months I couldn't even tell which one it was.

 

[zazouse]

Quote:
Same here i have had birds as big as geese that healed just fine on its own just make sure the flies are not bad around it.

 

[PeepsCA]

Oh my gosh, poor lil baby. What an ugly wound

There's not even enough skin there to even think about a stitch or 2 to close it up, yikes.
I think as long as you control the infection with either blu kote or neosporin it will eventually heal, but it's gonna be a while before she can go back in with the others. The sooner it dries up and scabs the better, and the blu kote will usually prevent others from pecking at scabs, so maybe it won't take that long for it to heal enough to be integrated back with the others. A tame house Guinea is possible, but will take lots of time and effort. She may love the attention, you just have to try and see if it will work.
Good luck with it, and Kudos to you for helping that lil baby!

 

[appychick]

Yes ,it is possible to make guinea into a house guinea as my friend had one for many years.
And I just found a 2 m old bantam pullet with similar but more extensive head/neck injury this afternoon as I had to move some to a new pen & she got bullied.....GRRRRR! But cleaned her up,lg bandaid to cover head/neckwith regular bandaid as a throatlatch cover over neosporin to keep wound soft as to heal with less scarring & less pain due to flexibility without as much hard scabbing. I gave my pullet Arnica 6x for pain & shock. She was up drinking in 15 minutes. Repeated every 3 hrs for a couple doses & then will dose as needed.
Really hope your keet recovers & becomes a spoiled rotten house guinea !

 

[lilchik]

I've had a chick with similar injuries in the past and used neosporin ( without pain reliever!) until it started to scab over then blucoat. Make sure it is scabbed over well and apply blue coat before trying to put it back with the others. Any sign of red or blood and they will peck it open again. My chick healed up nice and even got feathers, making it look just like the other chicks. Good luck, hope it heals and gets better for you.

 

[TexGardenGirl]

Thanks everyone for all the replies and encouragement! She made it through the night and looks fine. She's pretty quiet and seems content, but wil peep up a storm if I'm in the room with her. She freaks out when I pick her up but is now calming down immediately as soon as she realizes I'm not hurting her, and I think is starting to enjoy being held a little. She hasn't eaten much but I can see she dragged her little food dish around so she's trying. I'm going to smush up the feed into smaller bits and also give her a little cooked oatmeal with food mashed in and see how that goes. She is drinking well.
I think as long as I have her isolated I'm going to try to leave the wound open (covered with Neosporin of course) unless it starts getting dirty or something. I was fretting over what kind of dressing to use if necessary but a simple band-aid does sound just fine. Stitches didn't even occur to me because the skin is so far apart.
I'm encouraged by your experiences of similar things coming out successfully.

I was a little discouraged before because when I worked for a vet we had a (really amazing) case of a kitty who got burned by laying on a car engine (fortunately not caught in the fan as can also happen) and all the skin on his paw pads, belly and up one side was burned off. It took several reconstructive surgeries (the most fascinating surgeries I've ever seen, and also the only time I got queasy in surgery) to get the skin to spread and fill in, but he made it. He was an adult, though, and it was a much larger surface area, and keeping a cat's belly clean without letting him lick it is not an easy task. (He had the best owners ever - they had no medical background and not a lot of excess money but they loved the kitty and did everything he needed. The vet cut them a break on the surgery too since she was learning from it as well.) Whoops big digression on the cat there, sorry!
Anyhow, I'm feeling more optimistic about her health, and I'm encouraged to hear I may be able to integrate her sooner than I thought with the blu-kote (I have some but I need to find it...) I really don't want a house bird of any kind, but having one that's extra friendly to me outdoors is certainly more than welcome!
Thanks again! You guys are great!

 

[TexGardenGirl]

Well, less optimistic today. The wound continues to improve, but she's not eating. I thought she was trying to eat her crumbles, but now I think she was just walking through the dish. Here's what I've tried: finely ground crumbles, warm oatmeal, oatmeal with crumbles, plain yogurt, yogurt with crumbles, smashed boiled egg yolk, egg yolk with yogurt, egg yolk with water (all boiled), and little pieces of apple. She doesn't peck at or seem interested in anything. I spent quite awhile today smearing yogurt on the side of her beak, and occasionally some would ooze into her mouth & she'd swallow it. We're talking a tiny amount, though. She is still drinking water but she needs some calories soon, I think. She's 3 days old this afternoon. She's still tiny compared to her hatchmates.
So can I syringe feed her? And how much should I even shoot for? Just see if her crop is filling? I thought I heard that chickens choke really easily compared to mammals, is that true for guineas too? Is it better to tube feed? And are there details somewhere on how to do that, what size tubing, etc? I've done it a zillion times with my cats (they were 10-day old orphans, which seemed so tiny until I got newborn keets!

) but I don't know how on birds.
Sorry for the million questions. Any help is welcome

Thanks

Oops, almost forgot - I think I figured out how it happened. Not peck wounds but maybe she got her head stuck in the cage wires & scraped it off. Ouch! I saw another chick with its head through the wire which made me think of it (that one is fine) and I noticed a few smaller areas where a head might go out but have trouble coming back in.

And is there anything I can give her for pain? I know no -caines, but anything like aspirin? I know better than to just try human meds without advice...