SICK FLOCK !!!!!!!!!!

[BRYAN662]

I RECENTLY ADDED SOME NEW HENS TO MY FLOCK ( I KNOW IT WAS A BAD IDEA). NOW A LOT OF MY FLOCK APPEARS SICK. SWOLLEN EYES, RUNNY NOSE, LATHARGIC, NOT LAYING WELL, AND WEZING. THEY LOOK BAD. I TOOK ALL OF MY 12 WEEK OLDS AND PUT THEM IN A SEPERATE PEN BUT I CANT SEPRATE THE REST. I HAVE ABOUT SIXTY HENS, SIX ROOS, 40 12 WEEK OLDS, AND FOUR GUIEANES. CAN I TREAT THEM WITH TETRACYCLINE,SULMET, AND WORMER AT THE SAME TIME? MY DAUGTHER SALES THESE EGGS. SO I WOULD LIKE TO TREAT THEM FOR EVEYTHING AT ONCE TO REDUCE THE AMOUNT OF TIME THAT WE WOULD NOT BE ABLE TO SALE EGGS. IS THIS THE RIGHT THING TO DO? ANY ADVICE WILL BE GREATLY APPRECIATED. WE HAVE ONLY BEEN GETTING ABOUT 15 TO 20 EGGS A DAY. BOY WE ARE SCARED THAT WE ARE GOING TO LOSE THE HOLE FLOCK.

 

[BRYAN662]

PLEASE HELP!!!!!!!!!

 

[crazyhen]

I would not use anything until you know what you are fighting. If it resp. some people use tylan. I would cull like crazy and hope it stops. Clean everything with clorox. Sometimes birds that look good can be carriers. It seems you got caught with it. I did once too. I lost all but two of my flock. Some resp. diseases are for life. No matter what you give. Look at the rest of the post on disease in this forum. There is a lot of info. here that may help you. Good luck with your flock. Hope all goes better. jean

 

[ZepChick]

I have heard about the injectable tylan as well but have no experience with it. Wow, I hope your birds get better. can you isolate the symptom free ones? Or can you call a veterinarian's office? Sometimes they will give info over the phone and there is no charge (maybe info about the different meds you are wondering about)

 

[Jenski]

Please do not treat your flock with three different drugs at the same time. You will only stress their systems at best, and at worst you could cause serious and complicated problems to compound their illness.

There are several nasty things they could have, including coryza, infectious bronchitis, CRD, etc. etc. You would really want to have a positive diagnosis before you started throwing drugs at them.

If you can get one bird tested at a vet, you could reasonably diagnose and treat. If you are not near an avian vet, you could keep things clean and dry and hope for the best, and figure the strong will survive. Since it is respiratory, you could take a chance and opt for a course of Tylan, which I HIGHLY recommend researching before administering, especially if you go for injections.

There are more experienced folks who might have more advice to offer here.

I'm sorry you have learned the quarantine lesson the hard way.

Please let us know how it goes.

 

[Skip]

Whoa, calm down! I know exactly how stressful this situation is for you, but the worst thing you can do is to panic! DON'T PANIC! You need your wits about you if you want to save your flock.

We need more dibs on your flock. What's their poo like? Are they eating well? Drinking? Do you notice a funny smell? What does it smell like? The smell is particularly important. I'm suspecting infectious coryza, which is a very nasty disease. I had a scary experience with it once.

Not quarantining was definitely not a good idea.

Hoping everything turns out OK.

KEEP US POSTED!

 

[speckledhen]

Do NOT use all those meds at one time, first of all. Each is very hard on their systems, which are now compromised by disease anyway. Unfortunately, this is not going to be an easy fix. You cannot sell eggs from birds on these medications since you do not know the sensitivity of your customers to those. One of my own customers has a heart condition and cannot have any antibiotic residues in my eggs. I never use antibiotics except for actual serious injuries. That bird's eggs are not used for eating for at least a month afterward.
My solution is what crazyhen said. Unless you are okay with keeping a sickly flock of carriers for the foreseeable future, you must cull the ones you bought, in addition to the ones who show those same symptoms, then disinfect everything well. That said, you do not know what you are dealing with, bacterial or viral and antibioitics may do nothing anyway.

 

[mypicklebird]

So the birds you purchased look ok, but your existing flock is sick? That is an important clue- you brought in carriers of something.
If you want to find out what you are dealing with- I would consider picking a sick one, cull it and sending it to your state lab. From the description- of decreased laying and respiratory (have any died?) you may have IB or ILT- these are both viruses- antibiotics are NOT useful. Coryza is bacterial, and also has respiratory problems as the primary symptoms- and as previously noted in the posts- they smell BAD. ILT- many birds die.
You have learned the hard way, the need for purchasing from someplace with a good reputation and the importance of QUARANTINE.
You should not randomly pick antibiotics and dewormers with out knowing what you are dealing with. ESPECIALLY as you are selling the eggs. There are no approved antibiotics for use with laying hens, as there are no published withdrawal times for these things. Not a huge deal if you are eating the eggs- as it is at your own risk- but very unethical if you are selling to an unknowing public.

You need to inform the person/place you purchased from- they may be able to tell you what is happening if this is happening to multiple buyers.

What *may* have happened is you brought in healthy appearing birds- that were either vaccinated or recovered from ILT- these birds are carriers for life and will infect an unexposed/unvaccinated flock. Birds recovered from IB are carriers as well. IB often causes damage to the reproductive tract- misshapen and soft shelled eggs are common.

If you do not want to send a bird into the state lab, cull and disinfect is an option, but I would not treat your whole flock with a bunch of things that are probably not useful- and may get you into trouble with FARAD guidelines, as you sell your eggs.

 

[Andora]

It sounds like Coryza to me. When my birds had that (I have since gotten rid of the entire flock...and started fresh) they had very swollen eyes, runny noses, and chest congestion. They smelled funky. Coryza leaves birds as carriers for life, so even if they survive and have no symptoms they can infect any birds without immunity. I found out what mine had because I took a bird to our university's diagnostic lab and got a necropsy. The necropsy only cost $10 and it gave a full panel of test results. I highly recommend doing it! What state are you in?

If your birds do have Coryza and you want to save them, you can never add new birds or sell your birds without passing on the disease. Coryza can be stopped with Sulmet. That's what our university's avian PhD person told me. We have a huge avian research lab here...

 

[Jenski]

Quote:
Are you certain he said CORYZA and not COCCIDIA??