PURPLE COMBS AND FACE-pulmonary hypertension syndrome-aka Water Belly

[therealsilkiechick]

there is a 16 year old on another forum i am on in another state who greatly needs our help this is a pic of her birds she has showed me on myspace i had to upload to show u. i need bycer's help. i have never seen anything like this i believe it is a form of AI but there is 5 possible other things i see it may also be. I neeed any advice i can give this girl. i have contacted the state vet here only reply i got was where did u see it. sent details asked how to proceed to help this girl with no reply yet. i 'll post the pic so u can see and start telling me what you think it is or looks like or any advice and i'll post a few more details in next post. so hopefully we can get her help faster.
thanks,
silkie

 

[therealsilkiechick]

this is part of the girls reply back to us with some details. i know i'm a liceansed poultry tech we have gone over this in training but has been over a year since i have seen pics and details of ai. if i had to give my honest opinion i'd sereously think it is but i don't want to say for sure since there is other possabilities. the others i have never seen pics of to judge it. bycer's have seen many of things if anyone has any idea of what this is please post replies asap so we can help her. she has quarentiened the sick ones now but i fear whole flock is exposed since this has been going on for a few mths now.




We have about 15-20 chickens in that pen, but only two or three have the purple combs. Our other pen is closeby and none in that pen has any symptoms. In all (those still alive and those who have died) we have only about 3 to 5 that have had the purple comb. The two or three that died did not die within a close time period, the deaths have had a month or so between. No other symptoms have been noticed by me or my parents, we have checked for the swollen faces and none of them have one. I have been trying to find out what other symptoms to look for in them, to see if they had avian influenza, but I don't seem to be able to find anything on the symptoms that birds will have, only humans. It worried me at first because my mother and I have had the flu lately, but we haven't had many of the symptoms of it. I am hoping that it is something else, but I will learn to deal with whatever it is.

 

[poultrykeeper08]

i looked it up and these sound like her symptoms
Causes of Death Loss

Ascites (or water belly): Ascites can be caused by a few factors, including stress or cold nights. The heart and lungs have a hard time keeping up with the fast growth of these birds, and when the bird is put under extra stress, these organs slowly shut down. The symptoms are a slow moving, hunched-over bird that is breathing very heavily while the skin, comb and wattles turn purple. The carcass will be filled with a clear to milky liquid or gel.
hope this helps i am 17 and i would be crushes if this happened to my chickens

 

[pips&peeps]

Pretty certain it's not AI. Researching the Merck Vet Manual.......

 

[lauralou]

Do you know what breed of chicken they are, and what age?

Are they the Cornish X?

 

[KKluckers]

From what I have read for AI it moves very quickly. I could be a lot of things including heart failure in chickens.

 

[silkiechicken]

Those look like broiler (cornish x) chickens to me. That purple comb look and lots of "flip" or death is probably due to ascities. They gain weight so fast their hearts give out and thus they end up with ascities, can't breath, and thus turn purple similar to the pics seen. Warm temps can also do them in very quckly but that is unliky at this time of year unless they are in cramped housing. I doubt it is AI. And it is unlikly that a cold from a human will get to a bird. Almost all cases of AI are from people who almost literally sleep with their birds in rather unsanitary conditions because that is how they live in those parts of the world.

 

[MissPrissy]

Maybe I am wrong but that photo looks doctored.

The chicken in the back is red combed and yellow beaked. The one in the front is in black and white.

Sorry to be a negative voice here.

 

[MandyH]

That's what I was thinking missprissy, you reckon somebody is trying to get everybody riled up over the avian flu?

 

[arlee453]

I always thought AI was an acute illness, not a slow acting thing...

Looks like classic cardiac insufficiency to me - there isn't enough O2 in the blood. Now, influenza/pulmonary problems can cause that, but I agree that those chickens look an awful lot like self-destructo broiler/cornishX to me...

I'd be interested to hear how old they are and what breed they are supposed to be...