Sick bird with a very large sore

[Bakerjet000]

Hello my cross beak is having and has had severe issue a with this sore in the past week it's the size of a tennis ball. It doesn't smell. Its too heavy for her to carry. I've been giving her penicillin, Bcomplex, garlic, raw goat kefir and goat milk now just put chamomile and lavender tea on it and had her drink some. Been giving lots if electrolytes. Trying to bulk her up she's had a severe issue with weight gain she's so skinny I can't get her to gain weight. I've given her lots of tuna mixed with her medicated chick food, I stopped giving her that and gave her Mealworms live alongside kaytees baby formula she's been on before and it helped now its not. She doesn't look like she's going to make it and I'm just heart broken I would love any ideas or anything. Her wound is squishy. And a big scab. The feathers that were on it I picked out and a weird clear bloody fluid came out. It used to be super tiny. We have tried tying it up putting her in a onsie like they do for broken wings. I really don't think its broken because she used to use it when it wasn't so bad. Now she sits in one spot all day. Today she had kept a full food crop since this morning but she's been pooping/peeing. I've been putting homemade salves on it like cannaoil, and udder fancy cream I also give here a lot of electrolytes. Please help. So many things of what could be wrong I was thinking staph, cancer, hematoma from hitting it on something idk

 

[nightowl223]

I am assuming you have no vet you can get to. Because this looks like an emergency, and drastic measures look to be needed, to me.

If you have access to sterile razors or scalpels, I would lance it to see if you can drain off whatever is in there. It would require you have lots of sterile gauze to soak up whatever it is, too, and for you to have gloves on, especially if it's staph. If it's too heavy for her to move with it, something must be done, or she will just sit in her own feces and get even sicker.

If I looked at the pictures correctly, the cleanest area looks like the underside of her wing, and the other pics are from the top/outside of her wing. I would lance the cleanest area, after it's wiped down with betadine (or a store brand brown iodine), so there would be less chance of contamination, and if it's the underside, you have gravity on your side as you drain it, too. Once it's drained all it will drain, it needs rinsed out with saline rinse, and coated with an antibiotic ointment.

However, if the stuff inside the "tennis ball" isn't all liquid, and is actually more like cottage cheese, you have a worse situation at hand, and all of that cheesy gunk will need removed, with a sterilized hemostat or similar tool. If you can get it all out, you will have a MUCH better chance of her healing up. If not, it will literally eat the bones of her wing, and then move inward. This will likely require a larger cut being made, and that may need suturing up when you're done. But it does need all removed if that's what's inside.

I'll hope someone else speaks up and decides there's something else that could be done, but frankly, it looks bad enough as far as I'm concerned to need to be cleaned out. Immediately.

 

[nightowl223]

I meant to add - if you don't have access to a sterile scalpel or razor, you could try pulling one or more of those heavy scabs off, and hope one of them leads to the inside of the "tennis ball" for you to get it drained.

 

[Bakerjet000]

I meant to add - if you don't have access to a sterile scalpel or razor, you could try pulling one or more of those heavy scabs off, and hope one of them leads to the inside of the "tennis ball" for you to get it drained.

Thank you for your advice I had a feeling I should have done that but I was scared of hurting her and not sure what to do or even if I could do that. I don't have enough money for a vet nor any around here that would even take a chicken. She ended up passing in the middle of the night. Thank you for what you said though.

 

[Eggcessive]

Sorry about your hen. That looks like cancer, possibly a sarcoma, but it would need to be diagnosed by your state vet. I would consider putting her down so that she doesn’t suffer. Then, I would refrigerate her body, and send it in to your state poultry lab to get a necropsy, to look for avian leukosis. Lymphoma and sarcoma are tumors that can be from a retrovirus in chickens. Here is an article about leukosis:
https://www.merckvetmanual.com/poultry/neoplasms/lymphoid-leukosis-in-poultry

Here is a link to contact your state vet for a necropsy:
http://www.metzerfarms.com/PoultryLabs.cfm

 

[casportpony]

Welcome to BYC and so sorry for your loss. I agree, that looks like cancer to me too.

 

[SurferchickinSB]

Thank you for your advice I had a feeling I should have done that but I was scared of hurting her and not sure what to do or even if I could do that. I don't have enough money for a vet nor any around here that would even take a chicken. She ended up passing in the middle of the night. Thank you for what you said though.

Thanks for the update, must have been hard to see her so sick sorry about your hen.