I'm new to BYC. Glad to see there's a turkey forum as well.
My friend and land-mate has 5 chickens and 2 turkeys (male and female). We love the turkeys. They are water hogs and come running over any time we turn the water on. Tom and Georgia (for Curious George) are their names. Well recently, Tom got sick. I think it was Thursday, Sept 24th. The day before, he was chasing Georgia around, gobbling, puffed up and everything normal. The next morning, I went to her coop to check for eggs, (she had already let them out, and her chickens are new to laying) and noticed a TON of solid poops in one area, like someone (obviously a turkey) had pooped literally all night. I thought, oh man, someone must have eaten something bad. Well, a couple hours later, my husband and I checked on her flock again and, after some very hard looking through our woods, we found Tom was all by himself, and acting very sleepy and lethargic. My husband went to pet him and he woke back up and started walking back toward the rest of the flock (out of the brush). It was very weird. We isolated him in a dog crate at night, but always let him out in the mornings. My friend got some dewormer and some antibiotics for his water. She cleaned out the coop, removed all the pine shavings, and put the medication in the waterer in the coop as well. We noticed that Tom didn't really want to eat or drink. He would start to drink again by the next night. The next day, I let him out and I worked out in the yard so I could keep an eye on him. I noticed that he would stick to the flock for a little bit and then stop and lay down and fall asleep and the flock would leave him. When my husband got home, we went up to Tom and when we got to him, he saw us and got up, but didn't act alarmed. He has diarrhea all over him and in his dirt hole he had laid down in. This went on for a few days, then we noticed, or thought, he was acting better. Monday this week, he started acting better in the mornings, reacting to the flock and keeping up with them, but still walking slowly, but by the afternoons, he would get groggy again. By Tuesday, he was starting to react to the water again, getting all excited about water. But still, by evening, he would be slow and sleepy again. Yesterday, we thought, for sure, he's going to get better. We thought he had a flu or bug or something, but it hadn't transferred to the other turkey or any of the chickens. We did research and looked up all kinds of diseases but it was hard to find anything, since they are susceptible to a ton of things. We thought we would wait it out, because he was starting to act better. For a week now, we had isolated him at night, keeping him in the dog crate. Last night, it rained. Our friend worried about him getting wet and cold and she wasn't able to do anything before she left for work. By time my husband and I got up a couple hours after she left for work, we went down to tend to the flocks and realized that Tom had died. She said he was alive still when she left. So we know that he did, in fact, die sometime between 6 and noon.
My husband and I broke the news to our friend over the phone and she said she expected him to die all along. We recommended that she take him to a vet to find out why he died, so we could know if the rest of our flocks were in danger, although no other bird is showing signs of any kind of sickness. Throughout the whole thing, he didn't eat much.
Now that I've laid out the whole story, any of you have any idea what it could have possibly been? I don't know if we will be able to get to a vet.
My friend and land-mate has 5 chickens and 2 turkeys (male and female). We love the turkeys. They are water hogs and come running over any time we turn the water on. Tom and Georgia (for Curious George) are their names. Well recently, Tom got sick. I think it was Thursday, Sept 24th. The day before, he was chasing Georgia around, gobbling, puffed up and everything normal. The next morning, I went to her coop to check for eggs, (she had already let them out, and her chickens are new to laying) and noticed a TON of solid poops in one area, like someone (obviously a turkey) had pooped literally all night. I thought, oh man, someone must have eaten something bad. Well, a couple hours later, my husband and I checked on her flock again and, after some very hard looking through our woods, we found Tom was all by himself, and acting very sleepy and lethargic. My husband went to pet him and he woke back up and started walking back toward the rest of the flock (out of the brush). It was very weird. We isolated him in a dog crate at night, but always let him out in the mornings. My friend got some dewormer and some antibiotics for his water. She cleaned out the coop, removed all the pine shavings, and put the medication in the waterer in the coop as well. We noticed that Tom didn't really want to eat or drink. He would start to drink again by the next night. The next day, I let him out and I worked out in the yard so I could keep an eye on him. I noticed that he would stick to the flock for a little bit and then stop and lay down and fall asleep and the flock would leave him. When my husband got home, we went up to Tom and when we got to him, he saw us and got up, but didn't act alarmed. He has diarrhea all over him and in his dirt hole he had laid down in. This went on for a few days, then we noticed, or thought, he was acting better. Monday this week, he started acting better in the mornings, reacting to the flock and keeping up with them, but still walking slowly, but by the afternoons, he would get groggy again. By Tuesday, he was starting to react to the water again, getting all excited about water. But still, by evening, he would be slow and sleepy again. Yesterday, we thought, for sure, he's going to get better. We thought he had a flu or bug or something, but it hadn't transferred to the other turkey or any of the chickens. We did research and looked up all kinds of diseases but it was hard to find anything, since they are susceptible to a ton of things. We thought we would wait it out, because he was starting to act better. For a week now, we had isolated him at night, keeping him in the dog crate. Last night, it rained. Our friend worried about him getting wet and cold and she wasn't able to do anything before she left for work. By time my husband and I got up a couple hours after she left for work, we went down to tend to the flocks and realized that Tom had died. She said he was alive still when she left. So we know that he did, in fact, die sometime between 6 and noon.
My husband and I broke the news to our friend over the phone and she said she expected him to die all along. We recommended that she take him to a vet to find out why he died, so we could know if the rest of our flocks were in danger, although no other bird is showing signs of any kind of sickness. Throughout the whole thing, he didn't eat much.
Now that I've laid out the whole story, any of you have any idea what it could have possibly been? I don't know if we will be able to get to a vet.
