Possible Bumblefoot and Treatment

[chicken_guy_okc]

Hey fam,

Been a long, long time lurker here. In studying up what it would take to raise our girls, I spent a lot of time on this site. The knowledge has been so helpful and y'all's knowledge is why I am making this post.

We have 5 buff orps, free range our backyard, and we got them back in April. Aside from a couple of dog issues, we haven't had too many issues.

Today I noticed one of my birds, we'll call her Sister, favoring a foot. My initial thought was that she got into the fire pit to dust bathe and burnt her foot since there were still hot coals from our fire last night. I checked her foot and noticed a round black spot a little smaller than a dime on the pad of her foot. The pad was soft, no swelling or redness. I had previously done lots of reading so immediately I feared bumblefoot. I checked my most docile bird, Betty, and she had similar black circles on the pads of each foot. I decided it must be bumblefoot and went into chicken triage mode.

Betty was treated first. I soaked her feet in a bowl of hot water for 10 minutes and massaged her pads. I flipped her on her back and tried to get the scabs off or express puss, but it wasn't happening. I decided to just apply neosporin (no pain killer kind) and bandaged her feet with gauze and medical tape.

Sister is not at all tame, and even with her limp I had a heck of a time catching her. Once I did, I repeated the soaking but ended up doubling the length of the soak. The "scab" was softer and with tweezers I was able to remove it. I really expected there to be a lot of puss or something, but really I didn't see anything that screamed infection. I dug around on poor Sister a good while and removed some tissue with tweezers but really nothing came out except blood. I put the antibiotic on her and wrapped her foot as well.

One more of my girls had a spot, so I repeated the above. I got the scab off and no puss or anything that made me think it was infected. I finished the triage and checked my other girls. I was happy to see their little feets were fine.

My girls are good sized and I think the perch was too high. Basically eye level in an 8x8 garden shed I converted to a coop. I just now cut out a perch to hopefully prevent them from getting to the top and limiting them to a perch at about knee height. We will also be dowsing our fires with water in case the cause was burns from hot coals.

So, one bird limping, 3 birds with small black circles on their pads, pads are soft and not swollen or red. No puss expressed from wounds. Does this sound like early early bumblefoot? And does my treatment repeated every day or two days sound sufficient in knocking this out? I should have taken pictures and I probably will when I change their bandages.

Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated and thanks for all the knowledge in the past!

 

[chicken_guy_okc]

After a bunch of reading, I am convinced we have bumblefoot. I don't think what I am doing is going to suffice, so I went ahead and ordered some Tricide Neo. I have read mostly positive things about it's results, so I'm going to give that a shot before I go cutting into my birds' feets.

 

[coach723]

The puss formed in chickens is not like human puss. It is much more firm, a mass, sometimes described as like hard cheese. When you soak the foot long enough it will soften and often the puss comes out as a mass under the scab. So removing all of that is the key. How much there is depends on the amount of infection. Normally you remove the scab/lesion and clean it as well as you can, apply an antibiotic ointment like plain neosporin or a triple antibiotic ointment and wrap it to keep it clean while it heals. It can take a bit of time for any swelling to go down and for healing to start. I'm going to attach a couple of links that may help. The first is the method I use most. I have not tried tricide-neo but have read about it. I prefer not to use antibiotics on my hens unless really needed. I don't know what the egg withdrawl recommendation would be, if any, for tricide-neo soaking, I don't know if enough would be absorbed through the skin to be an issue.
https://www.tillysnest.com/2015/12/non-surgical-bumblefoot-treatment.html/?spref=pi
http://ouroneacrefarm.com/bumblefoot-treatment-tricideneo/

 

[chicken_guy_okc]

The puss formed in chickens is not like human puss. It is much more firm, a mass, sometimes described as like hard cheese. When you soak the foot long enough it will soften and often the puss comes out as a mass under the scab. So removing all of that is the key. How much there is depends on the amount of infection. Normally you remove the scab/lesion and clean it as well as you can, apply an antibiotic ointment like plain neosporin or a triple antibiotic ointment and wrap it to keep it clean while it heals. It can take a bit of time for any swelling to go down and for healing to start. I'm going to attach a couple of links that may help. The first is the method I use most. I have not tried tricide-neo but have read about it. I prefer not to use antibiotics on my hens unless really needed. I don't know what the egg withdrawl recommendation would be, if any, for tricide-neo soaking, I don't know if enough would be absorbed through the skin to be an issue.
https://www.tillysnest.com/2015/12/non-surgical-bumblefoot-treatment.html/?spref=pi
http://ouroneacrefarm.com/bumblefoot-treatment-tricideneo/

Thanks for the advice! We are in the same boat as not wanting to use antibiotics unless necessary on our birds, but since I am so green on raising birds, I'm going to give it a shot.

In the mean time, I am going to do daily foot baths for the girls. Something people don't often talk about is that a warm foot bath does more than just break up and soften an abscess. The heat actually helps weaken/kill bacteria. Hopefully between footbaths, neosporin, clean wound dressings, and tricide-neo we'll get this knocked out.

I gotta go out to the coop tonight with the recip saw and remove the top perch. I had removed the 2nd from the top naively thinking that without that stepping-stone perch to the top they wouldn't try and get up there. I was mistaken last night when I heard quite the ruckus in the coop as they were desperately trying to get to the top perch....

I'll try and add some pictures tonight as well.

 

[adickenscoop]

It does, here is some good information about bumblefoot from PoultryDVM - http://www.poultrydvm.com/condition/bumblefoot and several case stories about birds with Bumblefoot and the different treatment methods used:

Maomao's Bumblefoot - http://www.duckdvm.com/cases/maomao
Mabel the Cayuga Duck's Bumblefoot - http://www.duckdvm.com/cases/mabel
Snape's Bumblefoot - http://www.duckdvm.com/cases/snape
Daffy's Bumblefoot - http://www.duckdvm.com/cases/daffy

 

[chicken_guy_okc]

http://www.poultrydvm.com/condition/bumblefoot

Oh, my, that link right there let's me know where we're at. With all my searching, I did not find this info. I have an update and I think you all will agree with me on my amateur diagnosis. I even have pics tonight!

This morning, Sister was limping but getting around. I was in a bad mood at work all day knowing my girls are suffering. Honestly, I'd rather cull them than let them suffer. Some people think that is cruel, but frankly I think them suffering is worse. I got home from work, and Sister was not getting around good at all. Pretty much laying in the yard and limping excessively. Now, this limp might be bc I went after her foot tissue with tweezers or bc the infection is really bad. I think it is from damage with tweezers.

After a good chase, I snagged her up and got her inside. I soaked her feet (remember, only one affected) at 10 minute alternatives. Between soaking I worked on what I was hoping was a plug that would dislodge with my fingers only. After about an hour, I decided I had put her through enough for the evening. I bandaged her and let her back out with her girls. To my surprise, she was getting around much much better. She's still limping but that hot bath sure helped the pain. Now for her pics:

To me, I don't see a plug or cheese-like tissue. I would like y'all's thoughts for sure. I really think she is limping even more since I really went after her tissue last night. Bonus views of my field dressing. She was not very cooperative. Bonus points to anyone who noticed that I initially sprayed her foot with Blu Kote (sp?).

Next up, I went and got Betty. Remember, she has evidence of bumblefoot on both feet. She had worked off both bandages through out the day. I simple soaked her feet and sent her on her way since the scabs were still intact. I am planning to get her going on the antibiotic soak once it comes in. Here are her pics:

Lastly, we have Lucy. I had picked at her scab last night so I gave her a 10 minutes foot soaking and wrapped her foot after applying neosporin. Her are her picks:

You can see she is much calmer by the quality of my field dressing.

Anyways, so that's that. I really feel like we caught the bumblefoot early enough that there isn't a plug. The pad is soft on all the girls that have it and the tissue, to me, does not look cheesy. However, I am super noob at this, so I need y'all's knowledge and experience to know for sure. Thanks in advance, fam!

Additionally, I got the top perch cut down this evening. I need to go get some more bedding to really soften up their coop. Everyone is eating and drinking from what I saw. I considered isolating Sister in a cage in the house, but I felt that would be less sanitary since she would spend a good amount of time around her own droppings.

Questions, comments, concerns, advice?

 

[chicken_guy_okc]

K, forgot to say that my amateur diagnosis is early brumblefoot...