Question about Protozoan Infections? (from Vet)

[BuddingGardener]

Hi everyone!

I have a pet gecko, and for a routine vet appointment for the lizard at the exotic lizards and birds vet, I also brought in a chicken fecal sample to test for routine parasites -- it was definitely a squishy cecal poop, nice and fresh, that I brought in. I got a call back from the exotic vet that the chickens have a "protozoan infection" and I can either bring in my whole flock for a one time treatment or clean out the run/coop (??? I'm not sure we could clean the run enough to get rid of such a thing?) and see if they clear it on their own. Behavior has been fine in all of my hens. They were hatched on April 6th, 2022 of this past year and been acting like their happy clucky selves; I was mostly doing a preventive check. I didn't get exact information on what the protozoan was and google isn't really informative that *any* protozoan aside from Coccidiosis is a huge issue in chickens.

Has anyone experienced this before? Is there a compelling reason for me to round up my chickens and get them a one-time protozoan treatment, or since they appear and act healthy, should I let things be and just give the run as much of a clean as I can? I literally cannot find any problematic information about protozoans affecting chickens -- only the ones associated with cecal worms that would harm turkeys, but we don't keep turkeys. What would you do? Is there an over the counter method I should try instead?

For some extra info, I have four backyard chickens, two easter eggers, a black australorp, and a speckled sussex. Three of my chickens are laying, though laying has definitely slowed down to about 4 eggs a week per chicken. My fourth, the speckled sussex, hasn't started laying yet and I suspect she might hold out until spring with the way the days have shortened. I'm not sure if that's at all indicative of a problem. Let me know what you think, team....

Thanks for the help!

 

[Eggcessive]

I think your vet is trying to get your money. The protozoan parasites that affect chickens are histomonas (blackhead that mostly affects turkeys,) coccidiosis, and giardia. All chickens may have a couple of coccidia organisms in their poop, but it may not be an overwhelming infection. They should have been able to tell you which one they were concerned about. Were any worms, (such as cecal worms) found?

Coccidiosis is not that concerning to chickens over 4 months old who have been exposed to soil. They build up a tolerance to the local strains of coccidia, unless they are sickly. You can get most medicines yourself that treat coccidiosis, and the ones most commonly used are amprollium (Corid,) sulfadimethoxine and toltrazuril.
Here is an article I found about common protozoa affecting poultry:
https://poultry.extension.org/articles/poultry-health/internal-parasites-of-poultry/

 

[Florida Bullfrog]

I think your vet is trying to get your money. The protozoan parasites that affect chickens are histomonas (blackhead that mostly affects turkeys,) coccidiosis, and giardia. All chickens may have a couple of coccidia organisms in their poop, but it may not be an overwhelming infection. They should have been able to tell you which one they were concerned about. Were any worms, (such as cecal worms) found?

Coccidiosis is not that concerning to chickens over 4 months old who have been exposed to soil. They build up a tolerance to the local strains of coccidia, unless they are sickly. You can get most medicines yourself that treat coccidiosis, and the ones most commonly used are amproliium (Corid,) sulfadimethoxine and toltrazuril.
Here is an article I found about common protozoa affecting poultry:
https://poultry.extension.org/articles/poultry-health/internal-parasites-of-poultry/

This. Sounds fishy to me. Or even worse, they think they’ve found something that requires mandatory culling by Federal or State mandate and they want to get your whole flock in hand before they break the news to you. That’s the main reason I don’t have my chickens tested for anything. Either my chickens will survive or reproduce on the strength of their immune systems, or they won’t and they’ll die. I don’t want Big Brother culling my healthy birds because he found the antibodies of an infection they beat that he thinks no chicken should be allowed to have whether they have natural immunities to it or not.

 

[Shadrach]

Just NO.
Find yourself another vet.

 

[Finnie]

It seems odd that lab results would come back as “protozoan” and not what specific type of Protozoa. I would ask the vet what Protozoa it is and what the treatment will be, and the cost of the treatment. If they don’t know the type of protozoa, then I would not waste my money with their indeterminate treatment.

 

[BuddingGardener]

Yeah, the evasiveness bothered me. I did get the sense that it might have been for a liability issue regarding diagnosing and treating a bird that I technically did not bring in to see them, which is why I chose not to press too hard. I have a copy of the chicken health handbook and read through the section on protozoan diseases this afternoon and I'm still left with the idea that there's nothing really wrong with my chickens. I also find it somewhat suspicious that the treatment they would use would be a one-time administration in the office without a follow up. I had thought protozoan infections were handled with antibiotics in a specific course of treatment, and dewormers etc were to be administered twice. Most protozoan infections appear to be self-limiting in mature and healthy hens, anyway, and all four of my chickens are normal happy cluckers.

I was told by the vet, since the chickens aren't acting sick, I could completely clean out the run area like I clean out my coop, but considering it's basically a dirt floor with hardware wire buried beneath the hemp and sand, I'm not sure it'd be possible to clean it thoroughly enough to prevent reinfection of whatever-it-is, especially since the girls do range our property and forage for bugs/worms while I'm out with them -- usually about four hours per day. It was just a strange and unexpected conversation to have. At least my gecko is verified healthy???

Attached are pictures of my beautiful happy ladies. Only Eleanor, my speckled sussex, hasn't started laying eggs yet, but I'm kind of figuring she'll be our last holdout until the days get longer...

 

[BuddingGardener]

I think your vet is trying to get your money. The protozoan parasites that affect chickens are histomonas (blackhead that mostly affects turkeys,) coccidiosis, and giardia. All chickens may have a couple of coccidia organisms in their poop, but it may not be an overwhelming infection. They should have been able to tell you which one they were concerned about. Were any worms, (such as cecal worms) found?

Coccidiosis is not that concerning to chickens over 4 months old who have been exposed to soil. They build up a tolerance to the local strains of coccidia, unless they are sickly. You can get most medicines yourself that treat coccidiosis, and the ones most commonly used are amproliium (Corid,) sulfadimethoxine and toltrazuril.
Here is an article I found about common protozoa affecting poultry:
https://poultry.extension.org/articles/poultry-health/internal-parasites-of-poultry/

Yep, that's exactly what I was looking at. We don't keep turkeys, and she asked me if I saw any symptoms -- I said no, my chickens have been behaving just fine. It definitely wasn't amprolium that she was talking about because I managed to ascertain that it was a "one-time treatment" for protozoan infection, which made me wary. I don't think there's a way to eliminate the milder chicken protozoan parasites completely from their systems as far as I understand it from my own reading.

Also, no, there weren't any worms. No worm eggs, either.

Thanks for your input!

 

[McChooky]

All chickens are carriers of of coccidiosis once exposed but all don't get infected

 

[Finnie]

The vet would not tell me which one and was rather vague, as I asked what it would mean to treat them and they said they would need to see all the hens, weigh them, and treat them only once on site.

Sounds like a money grab to me.

 

[Finnie]

Or even worse, they think they’ve found something that requires mandatory culling by Federal or State mandate and they want to get your whole flock in hand before they break the news to you.

That’s a scary thought. One that never occurred to me.

I don’t like how the vet seemed to be evasive. You have to feel like you can trust your vet. The relationship is built on them being trained in areas that we are not, and we have to take their word for a lot of things. But so often you run across a story where the vet just doesn’t know so they take a shot in the dark, or they are really all about padding the bill. It gives good vets a bad name, and it’s hard to find a vet you can trust to begin with.